RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

The grand­fa­ther of the ba­by who was bru­tal­ly beat­en and lat­er res­cued by po­lice from a Clax­ton Bay home, is now de­mand­ing an­swers from the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty.

He yes­ter­day ques­tioned why the child was re­moved from his care and sent to live with a rel­a­tive on the Mara­bel­la Train­line, where she en­dured a vi­cious beat­ing that left her with a bro­ken rib, blue-black­ened eyes, cuts on her hands, and a scorch mark on her leg from an iron. Three peo­ple are now in po­lice cus­tody, one of whom has said the ba­by was de­mon-pos­sessed.

Speak­ing at his Clax­ton Bay home, the grand­fa­ther said he did his best to save the child. He ex­plained that his daugh­ter got preg­nant at age 17 and de­spite fil­ing a re­port of statu­to­ry rape, noth­ing was done by the po­lice.

“The po­lice say they can­not do any­thing af­ter she turned 18. The ba­by’s fa­ther dis­owned her from birth,” he said.

The grand­fa­ther added that the ba­by had been liv­ing at his home but in Au­gust she fell and hurt her leg. Short­ly af­ter, he said so­cial work­ers from the Child Pro­tec­tion Unit and the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty trans­ferred cus­tody to an­oth­er rel­a­tive, and the ba­by was tak­en to live on the Mara­bel­la Train­line.

Weeks lat­er, the fam­i­ly re­ceived re­ports that the child was be­ing abused. On Sep­tem­ber 26, the grand­fa­ther said his daugh­ter re­trieved the ba­by and brought her back to their Clax­ton Bay home.

“When I saw my grand­daugh­ter, I start­ed to cry. They tied her up and beat her. How could they do that to a one-year-old child?” he lament­ed.

He ex­plained that the ba­by had a bro­ken rib, cuts and bruis­es on her hands and face, and a burn mark on her leg from an iron.

“They went to the Cou­va po­lice and re­port­ed it but the po­lice did noth­ing. They said the Child Pro­tec­tion Unit had to han­dle it,” he added.

He said vil­lagers, con­vinced the child was be­ing abused, alert­ed the po­lice, who even­tu­al­ly re­moved the ba­by from the house.

As­sis­tant Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Wayne Mys­tar is urg­ing the pub­lic to re­port in­ci­dents of abuse fol­low­ing the res­cue of the ba­by on Thurs­day. Three peo­ple, in­clud­ing the child’s moth­er, are now as­sist­ing the po­lice with in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Mys­tar said a high per­cent­age of homi­cides in the south­ern and cen­tral dis­tricts are linked to do­mes­tic vi­o­lence and em­pha­sised the im­por­tance of pub­lic in­ter­ven­tion.

“Neigh­bours and mem­bers of the pub­lic, if you see some­thing, say some­thing. We are not in­ter­est­ed in your iden­ti­ty. Don’t just say it’s a do­mes­tic is­sue. Sev­en­ty per cent of homi­cides are re­lat­ed to do­mes­tic vi­o­lence, so if you see some­thing, say some­thing, and we will ad­dress this ro­bust­ly and take ac­tion.”

Pro­vid­ing de­tails of the ba­by’s res­cue, Mys­tar said, “Around 5 pm on Wednes­day, based on in­for­ma­tion, I led a team from the Child Pro­tec­tion Unit and Emer­gency Health Ser­vices to a lo­ca­tion in Clax­ton Bay. I ob­served a one-year-old child with vis­i­ble signs of phys­i­cal vi­o­lence. Emer­gency Health Ser­vices ex­am­ined the child and de­ter­mined that fur­ther med­ical eval­u­a­tion was nec­es­sary.”

The po­lice are con­tin­u­ing their in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Coali­tion Against Do­mes­tic Vi­o­lence (CADV) gen­er­al man­ag­er Sab­ri­na Mowlah-Baksh al­so yes­ter­day ex­pressed deep con­cern over do­mes­tic vi­o­lence, par­tic­u­lar­ly when it in­volves chil­dren.

“We en­gage reg­u­lar­ly with chil­dren and young adults who face abuse with­out much sup­port or in­ter­ven­tion,” she said, call­ing for an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to re­ports that po­lice dis­missed a case as mere­ly a do­mes­tic is­sue.

She em­pha­sised the need for a com­pre­hen­sive com­mu­ni­ty re­sponse, adding state agen­cies can­not tack­le the prob­lem alone.

“We need sus­tained, con­sis­tent, and re­sourced ac­tions by in­di­vid­u­als, com­mu­ni­ties, and the state to elim­i­nate this type of vi­o­lence,” Mowlah-Baksh said.

Se­nior Supt Naim Gyan is in­ves­ti­gat­ing al­le­ga­tions that the Cou­va po­lice failed to as­sist the ba­by’s rel­a­tives when they ini­tial­ly re­port­ed the mat­ter.

Clin­i­cal ther­a­pist and foren­sic trau­ma­tol­o­gist Hanif Ben­jamin al­so weighed in, say­ing, “We need to pro­tect chil­dren and en­sure that their rights are safe­guard­ed. When chil­dren are abused, their men­tal health is af­fect­ed, and this shows we are far from re­al­iz­ing true child pro­tec­tion.”

He called for a col­lab­o­ra­tive ap­proach, urg­ing, “Every­one must be their neigh­bour’s keep­er.”

Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty re­sponds

In a state­ment last night, the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty said it is con­duct­ing joint in­ves­ti­ga­tions with the po­lice in­to the in­ci­dent in­volv­ing the in­juries sus­tained by the young child.

The au­thor­i­ty said its in­ves­ti­ga­tion is psy­cho-so­cial, while the po­lice are con­duct­ing a crim­i­nal in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to al­le­ga­tions of child abuse and mal­treat­ment.

The au­thor­i­ty con­firmed that the child was re­moved be­cause her safe­ty was jeop­ar­dised.

“It is the le­gal man­date of the au­thor­i­ty to in­ves­ti­gate, ex­am­ine and de­ter­mine whether a child is in im­mi­nent dan­ger and to take the nec­es­sary ac­tions to en­sure the child is re­moved from harm. It is based on this pri­or­i­ty that the child was re­moved,” the au­thor­i­ty ex­plained.