Derek Achong

A close rel­a­tive of one of two men and a woman, whose bod­ies were found down a precipice off the North Coast Road, last week, has been held by po­lice as sus­pect.

Po­lice sources said that the sus­pect was held by homi­cide de­tec­tives two days af­ter the vic­tims’ bod­ies were re­cov­ered. 

Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, last week Mon­day af­ter­noon, the burnt bod­ies of 34-year-old ven­dor Ako Keon Matthew and 22-year-old Robin Ar­ling­ton San­cho were found near a shed where Matthew lived and op­er­at­ed a shop. 

Their bod­ies were found by their rel­a­tives, who were search­ing for them af­ter they were out of con­tact for a few days. 

The fol­low­ing day, mem­bers of the Hunter Search and Res­cue Group con­duct­ed a search off a precipice near to Matthew’s shed and dis­cov­ered the de­com­pos­ing re­mains of a woman, be­lieved to be Matthew’s girl­friend, who was re­port­ed miss­ing along­side him. 

Po­lice sources said that the sus­pect was sent for a men­tal health eval­u­a­tion at the St Ann’s Psy­chi­atric Hos­pi­tal and will be in­ter­ro­gat­ed by in­ves­ti­ga­tors once the process is com­plet­ed. 

Be­fore be­ing sent for the eval­u­a­tion, the sus­pect re­port­ed­ly con­fessed that he killed the three peo­ple af­ter he got in­to an al­ter­ca­tion with his rel­a­tive over a long-stand­ing dis­pute.

De­tec­tives of the Re­gion One Homi­cide Bu­reau are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.