RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Life has changed for the em­ploy­ees of Pen­ny­wise Plaza as they re­turned to work for the first time since Mon­day’s hor­rif­ic shoot­ing.

But while po­lice stepped up pa­trols and coun­sel­lors were on hand to speak to af­fect­ed work­ers, the em­ploy­ees say they re­mained trau­ma­tised by the fa­tal rob­bery.

Se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer Chris Nicholas said no longer could he do his job in the same way.

“It is a dif­fer­ent time now. We have to watch every­thing be­cause we nev­er know what will hap­pen,” Nicholas said.

His eyes glis­tened with tears as he re­called how he ran in­side and took cov­er when over 100 bul­lets rang out, shat­ter­ing the peace.

“At first I thought was fire­crack­ers, the num­ber of shots that start to take place. It was ter­ri­fy­ing, it fright­ened us, and no one ex­pect­ed that. We work­ing here four years and the first time this ac­tu­al­ly took place,” he said.

As a front­line se­cu­ri­ty guard, Nicholas said he re­mains wor­ried but felt hap­py to see fre­quent po­lice pa­trols.

“Po­lice came three or four times al­ready so we are feel­ing safe. Those who are trau­ma­tised feel bet­ter. The po­lice mak­ing us feel like we could stay and work again,” he ex­plained.

Nicholas said many peo­ple were now more vig­i­lant.

“Long time I was more re­laxed but now these days we on our P’s and Q’s. Now it is not a nor­mal re­laxed mood. We can­not sit no more, come out­side no more, that shoot­ing changed the com­pound,” he re­vealed.

For those who feel hope­less, Nicholas said there were oth­er av­enues rather than com­mit­ting crimes. 

“Call the hot­lines and coun­sel­lors and in­stead of tak­ing on the crime, do bet­ter. You are fright­en­ing your neigh­bours. Use the op­por­tu­ni­ties that the gov­ern­ment put in place for us. We are one peo­ple, let us do bet­ter,” Nicholas said.

Mean­while, Ru­pert Black­man who came to shop at Pen­ny­wise, said the shoot­ing should serve as a grim re­minder to par­ents that they should do bet­ter in rais­ing their chil­dren.

“It all starts from home. That lev­el of crim­i­nal­i­ty is out­ra­geous and fright­en­ing. You have to live and can­not put your­self un­der house ar­rest. This crime thing starts at home, par­ents have to train their chil­dren. Is young peo­ple, youths, ba­bies that com­mit­ting these crimes,” Black­man said.

Mean­while, a man­ag­er at Rat­tans, lo­cat­ed in the Plaza said the in­ci­dent was scary. 

She said when she heard the shots she walked by the door and saw what was hap­pen­ing. 

“I tell them to close the door, close the door. We stayed half an hour in­side there and col­lect­ed our­selves and then we left the premis­es,” she said.

The man­ag­er said prayers to God had helped her.

“It is all about prayers, come to work and pray for the best. These things can hap­pen any day and at any time,” she said.

Not­ing that Pen­ny­wise had good se­cu­ri­ty, the man­ag­er said she was grate­ful that coun­selling was be­ing pro­vid­ed.

Mean­while, di­rec­tor of Pen­ny­wise Dr Shiv­um Paladee said coun­sel­lors were hired to speak to staff through­out the day.

He said any­one suf­fer­ing from trau­ma fol­low­ing the or­deal should come for­ward and ac­cept help with­out feel­ing ashamed.