Senior Reporter
jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt
Relatives of Ryan Bharatt are calling for a curfew to be implemented after he was murdered sometime between Friday night and early yesterday morning, reportedly for refusing to pay extortion money.
Bharatt, 35, a cousin of murdered court clerk Andrea Bharatt, was shot once in the head. Police said that around 12:48 am, Cpl Caruth and other officers responded to a report of a shooting at Church Street, Carapo, where they found Bharatt. He was taken to the Arima General Hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival.
Police said that around 12:30 am, the truck driver and businessman went outside to move his white Nissan Navara when he was shot.
Speaking with Guardian Media at their Carapo home, Bharatt’s mother, Omarlee Bharatt, and his aunt, Kawlee Dipnarine, said they believe he might still be alive today if a curfew had been in place.
Bharatt described her last of five children as her baby and called on the police and authorities to do more.
“Besides that, from the time they hear about the shooting that took place, they could have at least blocked the areas and surrounded the areas so they would find whoever it is because it ain’t nobody come from South or Grande. It’s somebody close by because no vehicle didn’t come.”
Bharatt said she will find justice through God, not the judicial system, and described her son’s killers as cowards.
“They just let him have it, and the way they do it, shoot my child from behind, because they are a coward. They were supposed to face him face to face and let him know, not from behind. What they do there is not a good thing.”
She said that after her son told her about threats he received, he was prepared to die.
“A couple of months ago, about three or four months ago, he said to me, ‘Mommy, they want to take me down. Mommy, I’m sorry, but in case of anything, you will do this and do that for me. Mommy, you know, I love you.’ He tell his father the same thing. He take his sister, individual, and he tell them that his life has been threatened a few times.”
Dipnarine described her nephew as small in stature but big-hearted. She said he was always generous and willing to do anything for the people he loved. Struggling to hold back tears, she asked why someone would take his life.
“I can’t function. Life is too short now. You don’t know what to think, where to go. Why would people just kill people? I don’t know when it will ever have an end to this thing. I don’t know. I don’t know. I’m really sorry. I think that we need a police post, a lot of police presence in this village, in this particular village.”
Apart from Andrea Bharatt, the family has lost other relatives to violence, with at least two murders occurring in Carapo. In the past four years, both Christino and Darren Perreira were fatally shot. Last year, Christino, 55, was shot eight times while sitting in his car. He lived on Race Course Road, Carapo, Arima—the same home where his brother Darren was killed four years earlier.
Dipnarine said she fears visiting her siblings who still live in the community because of the ongoing violence.
“I myself afraid to come and visit my brother and my sister after certain hours. I don’t want to come here. There’s family all around. And if they have a wedding or a function, you’re afraid. You’re afraid after hours. You have to cut short your enjoyment and just run because it’s not safe in this village. I’m sorry to say, I don’t know why the police and them cannot put an end to this. Why they don’t do more patrols? I don’t know if the police and them afraid of the bandits and them.”
Dipnarine added, “Many times that racetrack where we used to walk from here to go to school in Carapo and come back, you can’t do that any more. You’ll get people with heads so and bodies so. So many times, it’s too much. “Why Arima is getting so bad? Why it’s so terrible? Why it’s so horrible? Why, why we can’t get more police, real police, real action to get rid of all these guns and all these ammunition that these people holding? It’s not a brother and sister love in the village any more, it’s not.”
Guardian Media called and messaged Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro regarding the calls for a curfew and increased patrols in the area, but up to late yesterday, there was no response.