An­na-Lisa Paul

A 16-year-old school­boy was among three killed yes­ter­day. Dar­shan Ram­nauth

was gunned down op­po­site his home in St Au­gus­tine, while an­oth­er man named Geno, age un­known, was found a short dis­tance away in the same com­mu­ni­ty. Two oth­ers in the same area were in­jured.

Mean­while, in an un­re­lat­ed in­ci­dent in El So­cor­ro, Tahir Liv­er­pool, 27, was killed by gun­men.

Be­liev­ing gun­men had fled Warn­er Trace, St Au­gus­tine, sec­onds af­ter shoot­ing one of his neigh­bours, Dar­shan rushed out of his home with­out a care for him­self and ran to where his grand­moth­er had been cook­ing to make sure she was safe.

How­ev­er, this act of love would cost him his life as he was con­front­ed by one of the gun­men who ran him down and shot him mul­ti­ple times. His body was found on Gre­goire’s Lane.

Hav­ing just eat­en, Dar­shan was in the wash­room when the shoot­ing be­gan, but he ran out of the house to check on his grand­moth­er.

A photographer from the TTPS Crime Scene Unit takes a picture at the scene of a double murder in St Augustine yesterday.

ANISTO ALVES

The teenag­er, a Form Five stu­dent of the St Au­gus­tine Sec­ondary School, was due to cel­e­brate his birth­day on Feb­ru­ary 1.

Res­i­dents said around 3 pm, a grey Toy­ota Corol­la car turned on­to Warn­er Trace and stopped in the mid­dle of the road where four gun­men ex­it­ed and be­gan shoot­ing at a group of peo­ple stand­ing in front of some­one's home.

The group scat­tered when the shoot­ing be­gan.

Geno was found dead a short while af­ter.

Two oth­er men, one of whom is vi­su­al­ly im­paired, were in­jured dur­ing the in­ci­dent. They were tak­en to hos­pi­tal where they re­mained ward­ed up to last night.

Dhanmatie Ramnauth, the mother of shooting victim Darshan Ramnauth, at her home in St Augustine yesterday.

ANISTO ALVES

Emo­tion­al­ly de­stroyed yes­ter­day as she gazed at the crime scene, Dar­shan’s moth­er, Dhan­matie Ram­nauth, cried and shook her head say­ing, “I don’t know if to cry or if to run.”

Want­i­ng to make sure the na­tion knew the teenag­er was no crim­i­nal, Ram­nauth said her son, who was due to write the Caribbean Ex­am­i­na­tion Coun­cil (CXC) ex­ams lat­er this year, had a plan for his life.

Al­ready a promis­ing straight­en­er and painter, she re­vealed that the long-term plan was for him to mi­grate to the US to live with his aunt.

She shared, “He stay home from school to fin­ish the car yes­ter­day and to­day, and the boy was sup­posed to come and pick him up, but the boy reached late.”

Ram­nauth’s moth­er said her son had been sav­ing up to make a trip to To­ba­go with his girl­friend ahead of his birth­day.

Lament­ing that the "in­no­cent are get­ting shot," she said some of the in­tend­ed tar­gets ap­peared to be walk­ing away un­scathed.

Ram­nauth’s last con­ver­sa­tion with her son took place on Mon­day night when she asked him if he want­ed roti for break­fast yes­ter­day morn­ing.

When she left for work at 6 am yes­ter­day, Dar­shan was asleep at home.

ACP Wayne Mys­tar along with of­fi­cers led by WS­gt Davis, Sgt Ramjohn, and Cpl Rahim vis­it­ed the scene.

Act­ing on in­for­ma­tion re­lat­ing to the get­away car, of­fi­cers were able to ap­pre­hend three sus­pects 45 min­utes lat­er at Five Rivers, Arou­ca, and they al­leged­ly re­cov­ered the four firearms used in the shoot­ing.

The search for a fourth man con­tin­ued last night.

In a sep­a­rate in­ci­dent Liv­er­pool, of Quar­ry Road, San Juan, was shot around 3.30 pm at Tem­ple Street, off Chanka Trace, El So­cor­ro.

The killings brought the mur­der toll to 41 for the year so far, com­pared to 38 for the same pe­ri­od last year.

Guns recovered from the St Augustine murders yesterday.