CASAN­DRA THOMP­SON�FORBES

Two mem­bers of the De­fence Force and a civil­ian were ward­ed in se­ri­ous con­di­tion at hos­pi­tal in To­ba­go up to last night af­ter a fight re­port­ed­ly broke out be­tween a group of sol­diers and Coast Guard of­fi­cers.One Coast Guard of­fi­cer was shot, while a sol­dier re­ceived se­vere head in­juries.Po­lice said the in­ci­dent took place out­side a night­club in Scar­bor­ough around 3.25 am yes­ter­day. In­ves­ti­ga­tors said the ser­vice­men were off du­ty, so­cial­is­ing at the es­tab­lish­ment when an ar­gu­ment broke out.

They said dur­ing the row Lance Cor­po­ral Vir­gil Gerveis was bad­ly beat­en in the head and when Coast Guard of­fi­cer Philroy Dou­glas in­ter­vened in an at­tempt to paci­fy the sit­u­a­tion he was shot in the chest.Po­lice said passer­by Nicholas George, 24, of Mary's Hall, who was on his own busi­ness, was al­so at­tacked and beat­en for no rea­son.He, too, sus­tained mul­ti­ple head in­juries, po­lice said. The three men were rushed to the Scar­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

Dou­glas un­der­went emer­gency surgery and his con­di­tion is list­ed as se­ri­ous.The T&T Guardian un­der­stands that the sol­diers, based in To­ba­go, and the Coast Guard of­fi­cers from Trinidad were un­aware that each was in the mil­i­tary.Sources said the ar­gu­ment be­gan in­side the night­club and es­ca­lat­ed in­to a brawl out­side the es­tab­lish­ment.

A spokesman said po­lice were in­ves­ti­gat­ing a re­port that some civil­ians got in­volved in the ar­gu­ment and beat one of the sol­diers. It was on­ly when the sit­u­a­tion got heat­ed the sol­diers and Coast Guard of­fi­cers re­alised they were all De­fence Force of­fi­cers.As­sis­tant Supt George of the Scar­bor­ough Po­lice Sta­tion is con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

De­fence Force speaks

T&T Coast Guard's Lt Cm­dr Kirk Jean-Bap­tiste con­firmed last night an in­ci­dent took place be­tween the sol­diers and Coast Guard of­fi­cers.He said an in­ves­ti­ga­tion has been launched and the De­fence Force is co-op­er­at­ing with the po­lice. He said the De­fence Force al­so un­der­stood that footage tak­en from CCTV cam­eras at the scene is in the hands of the po­lice who are re­view­ing the tape.

"It is un­clear at this time for us to de­ter­mine who did what. The po­lice are con­duct­ing an in­ves­ti­ga­tion and we (De­fence Force) are await­ing the re­sults.Jean-Bap­tiste al­so con­firmed that Dou­glas was shot in the chest with a .22 cal­i­bre gun.