Jensen La Vende

The coun­try's mur­der toll climbed to 96, four more than the cor­re­spond­ing pe­ri­od last year, fol­low­ing three more mur­ders that took place be­tween Tues­day night and yes­ter­day af­ter­noon.

In the most re­cent killing, 31-year-old Dar­manie Rose was stabbed to death in a rob­bery at his St Thomas Street, Tu­na­puna busi­ness place. Po­lice said Rose, a jew­el­er op­er­at­ed his busi­ness at his home. Around 3 pm a rob­ber pre­tend­ing to be a cus­tomer came to the busi­ness place and said it was a hold up. The ban­dit robbed Rose of jew­el­ry and stabbed him be­fore es­cap­ing.

In a sim­i­lar cir­cum­stance, 53-year-old Ian Charles was stabbed Mon­day morn­ing, mo­ments af­ter he won $6,000 from a casi­no in Port-of-Spain. Charles died at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal around 4 am yes­ter­day.

Po­lice said Charles, of Up­per Covi­gne Road, Diego Mar­tin, was in a PH taxi around 12.30 am on Mon­day. He told po­lice he asked the dri­ver to take him home and fell asleep in the car on­ly to be awak­ened by some­one chok­ing him and de­mand­ing the mon­ey. He was stabbed about the body, one of the in­juries punc­tured his lung.

At the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre yes­ter­day his wife Kathy Charles said her hus­band was a lov­ing man. She lament­ed how "sad" the coun­try has be­come while a male rel­a­tive called for some­thing to be done about the PH taxis. Charles said her hus­band was a kind man who had three chil­dren and three grand­chil­dren.

Al­so speak­ing at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre was the moth­er and sis­ter of 33-year-old Ryan "Ven­om" McKen­zie who was shot at Wa­ter­wheel Road, Diego Mar­tin around 9.30 pm on Tues­day. De­bra Bowen said her son was a very help­ful man.His sis­ter Coreen McKen­zie said pri­or to be­ing di­ag­nosed with a men­tal ill­ness her broth­er was a "girls­man."

Po­lice said McKen­zie was stand­ing with a group of friends on Wa­ter­wheel Road, Diego Mar­tin around 9.30 pm Tues­day, when a car pulled along­side them. One of the oc­cu­pants of the ve­hi­cle opened fire on the group, hit­ting McKen­zie once in the chest. As his friends scam­pered the killer then came out of the car and shot McKen­zie sev­er­al times about his body be­fore leav­ing.