Shar­lene Ram­per­sad

A gun­man sprayed bul­lets in­to a crowd of limers at a birth­day par­ty in Cara­pichaima on Sat­ur­day night, killing a fa­ther of two and wound­ing three oth­er peo­ple, in­clud­ing a Form Three stu­dent.

Kendall "Kit" Boyce, 32, was shot mul­ti­ple times and was pro­nounced dead on ar­rival at the Cou­va Health Fa­cil­i­ty on Sat­ur­day night.

An­oth­er vic­tim, Der­ron Richards is fight­ing for his life in the in­ten­sive care unit at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal. Richards was shot twice in the ab­domen and once in each leg. An­drew "Boyo" An­der­son, 27, was shot once in each kneecap and in the left eye. He lost his eye as a re­sult.

An­der­son's younger broth­er, An­to­nio, 16, was shot once in the left thigh. An­to­nio is a Form Three stu­dent at the Cara­pichaima West Sec­ondary School.

Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, the four were part of a group cel­e­brat­ing the birth­day of an­oth­er of the An­der­son broth­ers at a house along Wya­by Road, Cara­pichaima, around 9.45 pm on Sat­ur­day.Sev­er­al par­ty­go­ers were lim­ing in the road­way and Boyce, Richards and oth­ers were sit­ting on the trunk of a parked car.

A sil­ver AD wag­on, reg­is­tra­tion PDG 48, drove in­to the street, turned and came back to­wards the crowd.The dri­ver of the wag­on passed the group, stopped and one of the back doors of the car opened.A gun­man then leaned out and be­gan spray­ing bul­lets in­to the crowd.

While many were able to scam­per to safe­ty, when the shoot­ing stopped, Boyce, Richards and the el­der An­der­son were all found on the ground. De­spite his in­jury, young An­to­nio was still stand­ing.

The T&T Guardian vis­it­ed the area yes­ter­day and spoke to Boyce's com­mon-law wife, Nekeisha Je­re­mi­ah, who said her hus­band was at the wrong place at the wrong time.

"He went out the road to get some­thing and the next thing I heard is that he had got shot," a dis­traught Je­re­mi­ah said. "He was a very hard­work­ing per­son and nev­er in­volved in any kind of crime with any­one."She and Boyce have two daugh­ters, ages six and four.

"Ask any­one, he lived for his two girls. He was a great fa­ther and a kind and lov­ing per­son."She said she knew of no rea­son why any­one would want to hurt him.

"He worked as an all-rounder, lay­ing tiles, build­ing things, every­thing re­al­ly and he was well known in the area and al­ways chat­ting with some­one. I think it was just the wrong place, wrong time."

At the An­der­son home a short dis­tance away, An­nal­isa An­der­son said her fam­i­ly is con­fused as to why they were tar­get­ed.

"We don't in­ter­fere with any­one. We still try­ing to fig­ure out why some­one would do this," she said.

"It was a fam­i­ly lime with a few friends who just passed in. There were lit­tle chil­dren out­side too and this per­son just shoot up the place with no re­gard for any­body."She added, "This com­mu­ni­ty is a very close one. Every­one gath­ers on the evenings to play crick­et and foot­ball. We would nev­er ex­pect any­thing like this to hap­pen and now all of that has to change."

Her youngest broth­er, An­to­nio, who was treat­ed at hos­pi­tal and dis­charged, told the T&T Guardian of the heart-stop­ping mo­ments be­fore he was shot.

"I saw the car pass us and then stop and all of sud­den gun­shots just start to ring out," he said.

"Every­body was scream­ing and try­ing to run.I felt some­thing burn­ing on my leg and re­alised I had been shot."

An­oth­er eye­wit­ness, who asked to re­main anony­mous, said the shoot­er was wear­ing a black "Mar­vin Gaye" cap.

"From where I was stand­ing, I saw the guy lean­ing out of the car and just spray­ing bul­lets. All I could hear was scream­ing and the 'rup-rup-rup' of a se­mi-au­to­mat­ic gun."

An­oth­er of the An­der­son broth­ers, Lar­ry, called for po­lice pa­trols in the area to be beefed up as he said he no longer feels safe in his home.

"We are fear­ful for our lives now. Any­thing could hap­pen, any­time," he said.

"If a man could do that and hurt so many peo­ple, what is stop­ping him from do­ing it again?"

The T&T Guardian tried con­tact­ing of­fi­cers of the Freeport Po­lice Sta­tion to con­firm whether the weapon used was se­mi-au­to­mat­ic but was told no in­for­ma­tion could be giv­en on the shoot­ing. Calls to the of­fice of Sen Sup Ja­son Ford al­so went unan­swered.

Boyce was one of two men killed be­tween Sat­ur­day night and yes­ter­day morn­ing, tak­ing the 2016 mur­der toll to 218.