Homi­cide in­ves­ti­ga­tors were ex­pect­ed to ques­tion a teenage sus­pect yes­ter­day in con­nec­tion with the mur­der of fa­ther of two, Ra­jku­mar Pope.

The 17-year-old sus­pect, who was ar­rest­ed hours af­ter the in­ci­dent, is be­ing held at the Ju­ve­nile De­ten­tion Cen­tre in South Oropouche. He is al­so a rel­a­tive of school­girl Mari­ah Seenath, who was mur­dered last Sep­tem­ber.

Rel­a­tives said Pope, 45, had just picked up his 11-year-old daugh­ter, who wrote the Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment ex­am­i­na­tion ear­li­er that day, along with her moth­er, 17-year-old broth­er and aunt at Gulf City Mall.

They said Pope stopped at a mi­ni mart in the vil­lage some­time af­ter 6 pm on Thurs­day to pur­chase bread, leav­ing his fam­i­ly in the car. As he en­tered the store, he was al­leged­ly at­tacked by the sus­pect, and a scuf­fle en­sued.

The sus­pect’s fa­ther and Pope’s wife in­ter­vened and sep­a­rat­ed them.

Pope re­port­ed­ly re­turned home, which was a short dis­tance away, but lat­er com­plained of se­vere head pain. Emer­gency ser­vices were con­tact­ed, and he be­came un­con­scious.

He died while re­ceiv­ing treat­ment at the Princes Town Health Fa­cil­i­ty. Pope was a su­per­vi­sor at the En­gi­neer­ing De­part­ment of the Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture.

Of­fi­cers of the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions, Re­gion III, are con­tin­u­ing in­quiries. —Sascha Wil­son