Ak­ile Si­mon

Five peo­ple have been shot and killed in sep­a­rate in­ci­dents along the East West Cor­ri­dor and south Trinidad, be­tween Thurs­day night and yes­ter­day af­ter­noon.

The mur­der toll for the year now stands at 480. Last year's fig­ure for the same pe­ri­od was 536. Ac­cord­ing to po­lice, the killings oc­curred in Ari­ma, Arou­ca, Care­nage, New Grant, Sea Lots, and St Joseph, re­spec­tive­ly. The vic­tims:

�2 Ar­num Singh, 21, of Co­corite Road in Ari­ma;

�2 Je­re­my Davis, 25, of New Grant;

�2 Wayne Clin­ton Rocke, 42, of Lopinot Road in Arou­ca;

�2 Raphael "Poundie" James, 39, of Jones Street in Care­nage;

�2 Court­ney Reid, 40, of Agos­ti­ni Street in Champs Fleurs.

Rocke, a se­cu­ri­ty guard, was dis­cov­ered mo­tion­less in the guard booth of Fur­ness Chem­i­cals Ltd, at Con­ces­sion Dri­ve, Sea Lots, yes­ter­day morn­ing. The 42-year-old was em­ployed with Thor Se­cu­ri­ty Ser­vices. He was on du­ty at Fur­ness Chem­i­cals where the in­ci­dent oc­curred. His corpse was dis­cov­ered by a col­league who had to jump a wall to gain ac­cess to the com­pound. Ac­cord­ing to po­lice, a guard as­signed to a near­by com­pa­ny heard loud ex­plo­sions com­ing from the vicin­i­ty of Fur­ness Chem­i­cals, around 4.30 am. The guard told in­ves­ti­ga­tors he paid no at­ten­tion to the ex­plo­sions, be­cause it was a reg­u­lar oc­cur­rence. Short­ly af­ter 4 am, land­scap­ers ar­rived at the com­pound to work, and called out to Rocke, but got no re­sponse.

Cop-shoot­er mur­dered in Care­nage

Po­lice were al­so in­ves­ti­gat­ing the mur­der of James, who was gunned down in a dri­ve-by shoot­ing on Abbe Pou­jade Street in Care­nage, on Thurs­day night. Of­fi­cers said James had shot and wound­ed PC Si­mon of Care­nage Po­lice Sta­tion, while the law­man and an­oth­er of­fi­cer were on foot pa­trol on Abbe Pou­jade Street. Po­lice said the of­fi­cers had spot­ted James fir­ing shots at an­oth­er man in a bar, when they chal­lenged him. The vic­tim was de­scribed by po­lice as a "known shoot­er" in the Care­nage dis­trict. Ac­cord­ing to po­lice, James was stand­ing on Abbe Pou­jade Street around 8.30 pm, with an­oth­er man, when a sil­ver-coloured mo­tor­car passed by. The oc­cu­pants opened fire on James be­fore flee­ing the scene. James, po­lice said, slumped to the ground and died on the spot.

St Joseph killing

Reid was the lat­est homi­cide vic­tim who was shot while load­ing loose ma­te­r­i­al on­to a con­tain­er at Rail­way Road in St Joseph. He was pro­nounced dead on ar­rival at Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex. Po­lice said a man armed with a firearm ap­proached Reid at about 2.30 pm and shot him mul­ti­ple times in the head and neck. The vic­tim slumped to the ground as his at­tack­er quick­ly fled. Po­lice sus­pect the in­ci­dent may have stemmed from an al­ter­ca­tion Reid had with a group of men last week. In­sp Grant, Sgt Sinanan and Cpl Bernard of St Joseph CID is in­ves­ti­gat­ing.