A Freeport mother, whose husband was hacked to death by a mentally-ill relative, believes the incident could have been avoided had police and emergency health services acted and took the relative away.
Speaking at her home on Grant Trace Extension, Freeport yesterday, Pauline Gopie, 56, said her husband, Deodath, 58, did not have to die.
“When they came days before this happen, we asked them to take him to St Ann’s or to Ward 1 in the San Fernando General Hospital and they didn’t do it. That is what they does always do. This could have been avoided!” a distraught Gopie said.
According to police, around 4 am yesterday, officers of the Freeport station responded to a report about a man armed with a cutlass. When officers arrived at the scene they spoke to Gopie, who told them she had earlier seen her relative with a cutlass in his hand and blood splattered on him. Police later found the deceased on his bed with chop wounds to his back and neck. The suspect was found in his bedroom with the weapon.
Gopie said apart from the inaction by the police, her husband did not heed her repeated warning not to leave the cutlass where the relative could access it.
“I have a cutlass that I used to clean the yard and when I done with it I does hide it. I used to tell him not to have it outside because you know how (name called) is.”
Gopie said only Saturday night her husband had used the cutlass to cut pork for an upcoming order. The family ran Roti Boys catering services out of their home.
Recalling the incident, the housewife, who is partially deaf in the left ear, a scar of years of abuse at the hands of her deceased husband, said she woke up about 2 am and saw the silhouette of the relative with something in his hand.
After turning on the lights, she realised it was a weapon and ran back to her bedroom. She said she and her husband had been sleeping in separate bedrooms for years now.
“When I ran inside I try to close the door and while I was pulling it, he was pulling it open. I lock the door. But I did not hear my husband scream out or anything and I didn’t hear the dog, is only after I see the dog but like he did attack the dog first before my husband.”
She added, “It have a neighbourhood watch, I put on the light on my phone and start to wave it to get their attention and that is how the police end up coming.”
Guardian Media was told the family’s dog, Lilly, was strangled. The dog was later placed in a white crocus bag and left at the back of the house while the bloodied sheets were placed in black garbage bags and the bloodied mattress turned over nearby. The woman and a relative said they did not know what to do with either, so they were left there.
Gopie said her relative stopped taking his anti-psychotic medication months now and she would warn her husband about saying or doing things to trigger the relative off.
She was, however, adamant that had the police or emergency service taken the relative away or allow her to administer his medication under police enforcement, yesterday would have been another church attendance instead of a funeral planning.
“I bring the medication which he does take to calm him down and they didn’t even want me to give him it. If I had give him that, he might have stayed quiet and none of this would have happened. I was planning to go to church today (Sunday).”
While speaking with Guardian Media, officers of the Homicide Bureau returned and later continued interviewing Gopie.
