Clothes, photos, shoes, even a bank card and other personal items belonging to Neil, 25, and Nigel Seebran, 23, are cherished and closely guarded by their family at their Granville, Cedros home. Oftentimes, their parents, Chatagoon and Geeta Seebran, both 63, can be heard speaking to their sons with whom they shared a strong bond but the response is always the same—a gut-wrenching silence.
This is because 14 years ago, the brothers were asleep in their bedrooms when they were attacked, tied up and taken to a bushy area at the back of their home where they were chopped to death. Their killers dug a hole, threw their bodies in and buried them. In an attempt to throw off suspicion, the killers planted trees on top of the grave.
Unaware that they were beneath the dirt just 100 feet behind their home, for 56 days their parents, older sister Sally, other relatives, villagers and friends carried out searches in and around the area.
With no clue about their whereabouts, the family still clung to the hope that they were alive. Then, one rainy morning, villager Franklin Francis “guided by a vision from God” found the grave. There was a lot of speculation about who killed them and why but the police had no evidence to arrest anyone until four years later when Kareem Guadeloupe, of Point Fortin, allegedly confessed to police that he was with two men, “Sugars” and “Scrap,” who killed the brothers, but that his role was only to dig the grave.
Last month, however, following a trial in which Guadeloupe claimed he was tricked by the police into signing a statement he did not give, a jury in the San Fernando Supreme Court found him not guilty and he was set free. This was an outcome the Seebran family did not anticipate, resulting in their emotional wounds being ripped open again, flooding them with vivid memories of the murders that brought them despair, anger and sadness.
Perusing several newspaper clippings from 2005 to present at their Syfoo Trace home, Geeta smiled but it failed to hide the sadness in her eyes. The bedroom she shares with her husband is decorated with their sons’ photos, newspaper clippings and their favourite jerseys hanging on clothes racks and is similar to a shrine.
Neil and Nigel’s clothes are kept in bags in a wardrobe in Neil’s bedroom, which is now being used by their niece. In the living room, their shoes are proudly displayed on the space saver, as well as Neil’s bank card.
“I want to keep them around me. The memories and these things are all I have of them,” said their mother as she vowed never to stop fighting for justice for her two sons.
There will always be an emptiness in the Seebran’s home and in their hearts.
Wiping away her tears, Sally said, “The pain will never go away. Is like a broken record. It don’t have a day that goes by that I don’t think about what life could have been if my brothers were here. We were happy. We are a happy family, always laughing.”
Geeta said her sons were playful, humble and always willing to help someone.
She fondly recalled, “When my back hurting, Neil will squeeze my back for me. If my foot dirty, he will wet a cloth and wipe it for me.”
She admitted that her sons sometimes got in “a lil conflict in the rum shop,” but they were not “Bad Johns.” Geeta lost another child, her youngest, at one-year-and-six months. He was diagnosed with Down Syndrome. She called on other parents and people who are fighting for justice for their loved ones who were murdered to ban together. “I think it is time we stand up, protest, do something. It is so unfair to us.”
The disappearance
Recalling that fateful day on November 17, 2005, their father (Seebran) said before he left for work around 4.30 am he spoke to Neil.
“We spoke about cricket, West Indies was playing Australia. Neil ask me how much runs they make, ah say ‘Boy, West Indies now get bowl down,’ and with that, he went and sleep. I did not talk to Nigel.”
The evidence in the trial was that the killers hid in the bushes overnight and waited until Seebran left for work to attack his sons. Seebran returned home at around 9.30 am because there was no work that day. He noticed sand footprints on the floor in the living room and Neil and Nigel were not in the house. He realised something was wrong when he saw Neil’s tie on the ground in his room and some of their new clothes missing.
The neighbour told him he heard four gunshots. Fearful that something bad had happened to his sons, Seebran recalled that about two weeks before he had heard that someone had paid two men to kill Neil and Nigel.
In Guadeloupe’s alleged statement, a man who was known to the brothers paid $15,000 to have them killed. The family believes they were killed over an ongoing dispute over money owned to Nigel for a job.
Seebran recalled, “I watch in the back and I saw a piece of rope and down the incline I saw like they trample a track and I saw a patch of blood.”
He called the police but was told that they had to wait for 24 hours to make a missing person’s report. He said the police came later with dogs but found nothing.
“The police, the dogs, all of we pass that spot (the grave) plenty times not knowing that them boys right there,” he said. The family offered a $12,000 reward for any information on their whereabouts, but no one came forward.
Day brothers’ bodies were found
Then, on January 12, 2006, Seebran was in his yard when he was approached by Francis. Speaking publicly for the first time since the incident, Francis said the previous day he went to church and God gave him a job to do. That night and the following morning he got a vision from God that the brothers were in a pit and a voice told him it was time “to find those boys.”
Growing up in the same community with the brothers, Francis knew them well since they played cricket and football together. He hopped a ride in a three-tonne van to the Seebran’s home “under fright because is two bodies you talking about.” He told their father that God sent him to find his sons but Seebran felt they were not in the area.
“He (God) did not direct me directly,w I had to look.”
Eventually, he said, the father went to wash clothes and he continued looking.
“I got on my knees and I said, ‘Father Lord Jesus, I know you have sent me here to do something and right now I kinda lost, so if you can help me...I saw a kind of glow from the sky, I can’t explain it. I will say the glory of God…and a voice tell me to get up and walk a few steps.”
Francis saw a spot with loose dirt with some plants. He pulled out a plant and sniffed the root.
“It’s the stinkest thing I ever smell,” said Francis, who called out to their father to bring him a shovel.
“I started digging and it is the worst sight I ever saw in my life. The two guys in the hole together wrap up in plastic. I bawl out, I could not believe my eyes.”
Francis said he was frightened, so he told the father to tell the police that a brown and white dog had found the grave. He believes, however, that the killers went to “an obeah man and a spiritual man” to “cover everything up” and several people—including his brother Martin “Bobhead” Francis —were involved in the incident.
He said it was strange that the police, police dogs, relatives and villagers searched that area and never noticed the grave. Francis does not think that his brother knew they had planned to kill Seebrans.
“He went to frighten (them) but when he realised is kill them fellas went to kill, then he try to pull out. I want to believe that the money that he get, that he was not satisfied with it, so he started wanting to blackmail them fellas and they set up somebody to kill he and all.”
His brother was stabbed to death about a month after Seebran’s sons were murdered.
Francis is disappointed that the police are yet to arrest the men responsible for the murders. “They were not the best, but nobody deserves to die in that way,” he said. After almost two months of emotional torture, Geeta recalled being happy the day her sons’ bodies were unearthed. “Like a joy come in my heart that day because I was crying and for 56 days I pray and did not eat. I put my hand up and ah say ‘Lord, bring meh children for meh, if is their bone self put them in my hand,’ and like a joy come in my heart, look them, although they were dead.”
Family wants justice
Told by the police that the investigation is still open, the family is calling on Police Commissioner Gary Griffith to closely monitor the investigation and ensure the brothers’ killers are arrested and brought to justice.
Geeta lamented, “If that guy (Guadeloupe) is not guilty, where are the guilty ones? He call names in his statement who was there with him. The driver (who also testified in the trial that the police intimidated him into signing a statement) say he drop the three men on the hill a lil higher up from here (their home). Why they did not arrest the others? My children did not kill themselves, they come inside the house, take the children, chop them, dig a hole and bury them. So what they want this family to do?”
In Guadeloupe’s alleged statement, two other people named only as “Sugars” and “Scrap” were identified as the killers. However, the family said “Sugars” was shot and killed by the police a few years ago. Even more traumatic for the family is that they often see the other people suspected of having a hand in the murders roaming freely in their village, Point Fortin and environs.
“Fourteen years after is the same. We are not able to move on. We ain’t get no justice, not even in the court. My brothers murdered, chop up and bury in the back there and the hardest part about it we have to watch the murderers in their face,” Sally said.
Despite their pain and grief, Geeta said they never took the law into their own hands.
“If Mr Gary Griffith could come down in this area to search for them murderers that will be very nice.”
The family said the police did not gather sufficient evidence then, but with the modern crime detection tools available to the police now, they could find the killers and the man who paid them to murder the brothers. The killers, the family believes, changed into Neil’s and Nigel’s clothes, which they stole from their home after the killed them. “They took the clothes because it was a messy scene. They change their clothes and drop the coverall in the hole. There was blood everywhere, all on the leaf of the trees.”
The family questioned why a coverall and Marvin Gay found in the hole with their sons were never mentioned during the trial and whether they were sent for forensic testing. Neil and Nigel never reported the death threat because, according to their sister, “they did not take it on as back then murders were not the norm.” Expressing no confidence in the trial by jury system, the family called for it to be abolished.
“This is 2019, 1962 laws cannot work for 2019, we are now a lawless society, disobedient and disrespectful. All our morals and values are gone. We cannot use those laws in the courtroom. Mr Griffith using lie detector in the police service that is a good thing, but what about the courts. You cannot rely on 12 random people who don’t know anything about the law,” said Sally.
The family said they now live in fear knowing that the killers are still at large.
Investigation still active
A senior police officer familiar with the matter said the investigation into the brothers’ murders was still open. “Other persons named were mentioned in the statement (allegedly given by Guadeloupe).” He said the file was “actively” being reviewed. The officer confirmed that one of the assailants identified as “Sugars” in the statement was killed by the police three years ago. David “Sugars” Gittens, he said, was involved in a shoot-out with the police in Point Fortin. It was reported then that Gitten had outstanding warrants dating back to 2008 for gun-related offences, and was wanted for at least five murders between Point Fortin and Cedros.
Criminologist: Forensic evidence only solution
When contacted on Friday for his comment on the case, criminologist Daurius Figueira said in the absence of witnesses in 2019 to the Seebran brothers’ murders, the only possible solution is forensic evidence.
He said “There are two lines of investigation, the police moved for a confession from Guadeloupe.
With the confession they considered the case closed. When the confession was overturned in a court of law, the problem now arises—1: How scientifically was the grave investigated to prevent cross-contamination? 2: How or if the evidence gathered from the gravesite was stored and preserved to ensure its integrity in 2019?
“In 2005 T&T did not have the necessary DNA facilities, either private sector or State. We did not have that capacity and most importantly, in this case, is the issue of the DNA database.”
He said if all the evidence collected from the grave was properly stored, and proper DNA profiles can be derived from that evidence in 2019, the issue arising was whether the authorities had a DNA database to run it through to get “hits” or a match. Figueira said there was no witness to the actual event who had come forward.
He said Guadelopue was tried on the basis of his confession and nothing else.
Figueira said when the confession collapsed, the case collapsed, that was the problem with the entire investigation and the chain of evidence.