SASCHA WIL­SON

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

A 15-year-old boy who was in a car with his rel­a­tives on their way to church yes­ter­day morn­ing, was shot by a stray bul­let in South Oropouche.

Po­lice said the teenag­er, his aunt, un­cle and 24-year-old cousin, had just left home and were ex­it­ing Agri­cul­tur­al Road to turn on­to the main road at Dow Vil­lage when they en­coun­tered a fra­cas be­tween a group of Venezue­lans, and 49-year-old res­i­dent Kern La Fou­cade.

Dur­ing the melee, the Venezue­lans re­port­ed­ly chopped La Fou­cade in his face and shot three times An­oth­er res­i­dent, 37-year-old Keil La Rode, who was on his way to work, was shot in his left foot.

Po­lice said the fight start­ed around 8.30 am at the near­by Sweet Bay bar. La Fou­cade ran to­wards his home as the in­ci­dent es­ca­lat­ed but was chased by the Venezue­lans and shot near a par­lour.

The teenag­er, a Form Four stu­dent, La Fou­cade and La Rode are all now ward­ed at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

Po­lice lat­er ar­rest­ed five of the Venezue­lans and seized a pis­tol.

In a tele­phone in­ter­view yes­ter­day, the teenag­er’s aunt said they are Je­ho­vah’s Wit­ness­es and were on the way to ser­vice at a church in La Brea. How­ev­er, she said as they ap­proached the area near the bar, they en­coun­tered a group of men in­volved in an al­ter­ca­tion at the top of the street. She said she heard gun­shots and some­thing struck the car. She said her nephew then com­plained that he got shot and they took him to the hos­pi­tal.

The bul­let pierced his left leg, just above his knee.

The aunt said, “I don’t know what they (Gov­ern­ment) are do­ing in terms of deal­ing with this sit­u­a­tion, but it is just a sad sit­u­a­tion, that you’re just go­ing about mind­ing your own busi­ness, go­ing to church and some­thing like this could hap­pen. It’s just sad that peo­ple can walk the streets freely with guns and you are the per­son that pick up a bul­let.

“If my hus­band had ac­tu­al­ly turned that car to the left I would have been in the di­rec­tion of the bul­let. That bul­let would have come in and hit me in my stom­ach.”

She said de­pend­ing on the re­sults of the CT scan, the doc­tors will de­cide whether to re­move the bul­let.

How­ev­er, she said her nephew was do­ing well.

“We are just glad that it wasn’t worse and that he is in a con­di­tion where he is up and talk­ing, and we’re at the hos­pi­tal with him right now and it’s just a sad sit­u­a­tion to me. It is not trau­ma­tis­ing, and he isn’t trau­ma­tised be­cause he’s up and talk­ing.”

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the scene, two spent shells were still on the ground.

At La Fou­cade’s home, a man said fam­i­ly mem­bers were at the hos­pi­tal with him and he could not com­ment on the in­ci­dent.

Oropouche po­lice are in­ves­ti­gat­ing.