SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

Se­nior Re­porter

shal­iza.has­sanali@guardian.co.tt

Nine days ago, 75-year-old pen­sion­er Lutch­min Bick­ram died af­ter be­ing vi­o­lent­ly at­tacked and beat­en dur­ing a home in­va­sion. She had just re­turned home from the bank, af­ter cash­ing her pen­sion cheque, when she came face to face with an in­trud­er in her bed­room. The el­der­ly woman was hit re­peat­ed­ly un­til she col­lapsed. Her at­tack­er then ran off with her purse con­tain­ing $3,700 and an iden­ti­fi­ca­tion card.

Bick­ram, who suf­fered three heart at­tacks while be­ing treat­ed at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal, died last Sat­ur­day.

It was not the first time crim­i­nals had in­vad­ed her home at Cal­cut­ta #2, Freeport, and robbed her and it was not an iso­lat­ed case of a home in­va­sion that turned dead­ly. There has been a se­ries of rob­beries at the homes of se­nior cit­i­zens in the last few months and some of those el­der­ly vic­tims died from gun­shot wounds, stab­bings, stran­gu­la­tion and be­ing blud­geoned. Those who sur­vived were bru­talised, tor­tured, hog-tied, choked, set on fire, bug­gered and raped by crim­i­nals who showed them no mer­cy.

In April 2021, Siparia pen­sion­er Util­da Joseph, 96, who was ho­n­oured for be­ing the old­est res­i­dent in her Quar­ry Vil­lage com­mu­ni­ty, was stran­gled and her bank book and iden­ti­fi­ca­tion card stolen.

Last March, pen­sion­ers Ramjit Ly­man, 73, and his wife, Rookdeo Ma­hadeo, 67, could not fight off at­tack­ers who broke in­to their Clarke Road, Bar­rack­pore home.

In April, the com­mu­ni­ty of New Grant was plunged in­to mourn­ing when 76-year-old Odessa Con­stance was found mur­dered at her Nagee Road home. Con­stance’s blood­ied body was dis­cov­ered by URP work­ers who be­came con­cerned when they did not see her in her gallery as was cus­tom­ary.

Last month, the life­less body of well-known pro­pri­etor Char­maine Shaffie, 63, was found at her East­ern Main Road, Matu­ra, home. Po­lice be­lieve the moth­er of four was suf­fo­cat­ed and robbed by her at­tack­ers. Shaffie op­er­at­ed Char­maine’s Bar and Mi­ni Mart.

Sta­tis­tics from the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) show that be­tween 2015 and 2019 a to­tal of 134 mur­ders were com­mit­ted against peo­ple over the age of 60. Last year, 34 peo­ple ages 60 to 88 had been killed and so far this year, eight peo­ple be­tween the ages of 63 and 77 were.

The Sun­day Guardian was un­able to ob­tain sta­tis­tics on how many se­nior cit­i­zens over the age of 60 were mur­dered in 2020 and 2021.

An analy­sis of last year’s mur­ders doc­u­ment­ed by the TTPS showed that of the 34 mur­ders, 24 were men with ten women.

The da­ta did not name the vic­tims or pro­vide de­tails sur­round­ing their deaths. How­ev­er, a break­down of the sta­tis­tics showed that most of the killings oc­curred along the East-West Cor­ri­dor and in south Trinidad, while 11 of the vic­tims lived be­tween Barataria and Ari­ma. Arou­ca and Ari­ma ac­count­ed for five homi­cides, in­clud­ing one where the vic­tim was an 83-year-old man.

The old­est vic­tim was an 88-year-old man who was mur­dered at a Pe­tit Bourg busi­ness place last April.

In the rur­al dis­trict of Moru­ga, three pen­sion­ers ages 82, 68 and 67 were killed be­tween Ju­ly and No­vem­ber. Ar­eas such as Clax­ton Bay, Fyz­abad, San Fer­nan­do, Phillip­ine, Siparia, Pe­nal and Debe each record­ed one homi­cide of an el­der­ly per­son.

Cen­tral had two mur­ders—one in Ch­agua­nas and the oth­er in Cunu­pia.

Over the 12-month pe­ri­od, there were six mur­ders in Jan­u­ary, five in April and four in Ju­ly. In Feb­ru­ary, March and De­cem­ber there were three mur­ders each.

With al­most 200 mur­ders com­mit­ted against the el­der­ly in the last eight and half years, many of them stem­ming from vi­o­lent home in­va­sions and rob­beries, Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher has ap­point­ed a home in­va­sion unit in the TTPS. In a What­sApp mes­sage she re­vealed that the unit is led by ACP Kent Ghisyawan and com­pris­es of­fi­cers of the West­ern Di­vi­sion CID and Gang Units from the Port-of-Spain and North­ern Di­vi­sions, as well as law­men from the South­ern, Cen­tral and South West­ern di­vi­sions.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher said she has set in mo­tion plans and strate­gies to cap­ture the of­fend­ers and re­store safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty in com­mu­ni­ties.

“I fo­cused on my team’s dis­cus­sions and strate­gies to ad­dress the in­creased re­ports of home in­va­sions which are clas­si­fied as rob­beries, house break­ings, bur­glar­ies and oth­er gang-re­lat­ed of­fences,” she ex­plained, adding that Hare­wood-Christo­pher she is cog­nisant that “these crimes can be very trau­mat­ic as one’s pri­va­cy is vi­o­lat­ed and in some cas­es, the ex­pe­ri­ence can al­so be fa­tal.”

The unit has been di­rect­ed to fo­cus on util­is­ing in­tel­li­gence-led polic­ing and col­lab­o­rat­ing with com­mu­ni­ties.

“These op­er­a­tions are al­so da­ta-dri­ven util­is­ing in­for­ma­tion from the Crime and Prob­lem Analy­sis Branch (CA­PA) and this strate­gi­cal­ly guides the de­ploy­ment of re­sources based on the tem­po­ral and spa­tial analy­sis of these crimes. These op­er­a­tions were on­go­ing to ad­dress the is­sue of vi­o­lent crimes gen­er­al­ly. How­ev­er, with the in­creased re­ports of home in­va­sions, the ex­er­cis­es were in­ten­si­fied,” the CoP said.

Sev­er­al known gang­sters and oth­er of­fend­ers were tar­get­ed and 22 in­di­vid­u­als are now be­fore the courts for rob­beries, house break-ins, pos­ses­sion of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion and gang-re­lat­ed of­fences.

“In ad­di­tion, fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions are be­ing con­duct­ed with a view of dis­man­tling the gangs iden­ti­fied.”

Hare­wood-Christo­pher has al­so man­dat­ed the TTPS’ ten di­vi­sions to host reg­u­lar com­mu­ni­ty meet­ings to ed­u­cate the pub­lic on home safe­ty, crime pre­ven­tion and the im­por­tance of neigh­bour­hood watch groups.

She said po­lice pa­trols are ef­fec­tive as sev­er­al ar­rests have been made and get­away ve­hi­cles in­ter­cept­ed. This has led to a re­duc­tion in se­ri­ous crimes in all di­vi­sions com­pared to 2022, she said.

“The TTPS con­tin­ues to utilise all avail­able re­sources to en­sure the safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty of all. This we pledge to do in col­lab­o­ra­tion with mem­bers of the pub­lic with a full ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the crit­i­cal role of the pub­lic in our crime pre­ven­tion ini­tia­tives.”

Since the for­ma­tion of the unit two months ago, ACP Ghisyawan and his team of 40 of­fi­cers have been work­ing around the clock. He said the CIDs have been “deal­ing with the pred­i­cate of­fences” and the Gang Unit has been charg­ing in­di­vid­u­als with gang-re­lat­ed mat­ters.

“We have adopt­ed a one-team ap­proach,” he ex­plained

Ghisyawan ad­mit­ted that the work­load is de­mand­ing but said: “We are giv­ing it our all. We have been work­ing ear­ly and late al­most every day to en­sure that we are on the same page.”

The team has been op­er­at­ing out of the Crim­i­nal Di­vi­sion of­fice and in their first ex­er­cise in May, they ar­rest­ed six peo­ple in the Port-of-Spain and west­ern dis­tricts who were charged. As of mid-Ju­ly, more than 40 cas­es were be­fore the courts.

Not­ing that this was achieved through net­work­ing, shar­ing in­for­ma­tion and reg­u­lar pa­trols, Ghisyawan ac­knowl­edged that rob­beries com­mit­ted against the el­der­ly are wor­ry­ing.

“Every rob­bery or every crime is a wor­ry for the po­lice,” he said.

Pressed on whether the po­lice are pur­su­ing any leads in Bick­ram’s mur­der, Ghisyawan said the Gang Unit and Cen­tral CID re­ceived some in­for­ma­tion which they are work­ing on. He said not every­one is will­ing to sup­port the po­lice.

“We have peo­ple who would have seen things hap­pen . . . even mur­ders and they do not want to get in­volved. If we could get peo­ple to change their mind­set in sup­port­ing the po­lice, we would make some head­way,” he said.

In the case of home in­va­sions turn­ing dead­ly for se­nior cit­i­zens, Ghisyawan could not say how many crim­i­nals have been charged with those mur­ders in the last year.

He said as gang mem­bers shift lo­ca­tions to avoid ar­rest they re­cruit new mem­bers.

“If we could lock down this core group of peo­ple, we would be able to drop the num­ber of rob­beries, lar­ce­nies and house break­ings,” he said.

Ghisyawan said small pock­ets of crim­i­nals have been emerg­ing and they “pig­gy­back on es­tab­lished groups” to seek out crimes of op­por­tu­ni­ty.

He said one of the ob­sta­cles the po­lice have been en­coun­ter­ing in­volves un­lock­ing cell phones used by crim­i­nals.

“When you ar­rest these peo­ple it’s a task to un­lock their phones. Some­times you have to get for­eign as­sis­tance. So, all the in­for­ma­tion they have on the phone is not read­i­ly avail­able,” he ad­mit­ted

He said the TTPS is sourc­ing the req­ui­site soft­ware to as­sist them.

Com­par­ing this year’s se­ri­ous crimes (from Jan­u­ary 1 to Ju­ly 7) to the same pe­ri­od last year, Ghisyawan said there has been a re­duc­tion “in al­most all the cat­e­gories of crime with the ex­cep­tion of mur­ders and fraud.”

For­mer di­rec­tor of the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing Dr Jen­nifer Rouse said the fre­quen­cy with which se­nior cit­i­zens are be­ing mur­dered is alarm­ing and dis­turb­ing.

“There is so much anger with these crim­i­nals. There is an un­der­bel­ly of vi­o­lence. The more we pussy foot and tip­toe, we are not con­fronting the ele­phant in the room. There is no han­dle on the height, depth, width or length of how much the vi­o­lence is,” she said.

Rouse said the vi­cious at­tacks and sense­less killings have T&T’s age­ing pop­u­la­tion liv­ing in fear and that lev­el of fear “weak­ens your im­mune sys­tem. You al­so feel like you can’t go be­yond your front door.”

Stress, un­easi­ness and wor­ry are fac­tors that se­vere­ly af­fect an el­der­ly per­son who sur­vives a home in­va­sion, she added.

“There is de­layed trau­ma. This could lead to their death be­fore time. In oth­er words, there would be la­tent death that was not im­me­di­ate at the scene but their health would be af­fect­ed in such a trau­mat­ic way un­til they die.”

Rouse said such deaths some­times come swift­ly, “es­pe­cial­ly if a hus­band is killed in a home in­va­sion and the wife sur­vives or vice ver­sa. That spouse would die of grief, wor­ry, trau­ma or stress.” They some­times give up on life af­ter be­ing vi­o­lat­ed and robbed of dig­ni­ty.

“It’s a ma­jor con­cern. It’s wor­ri­some,” she said.

T&T’s age­ing pop­u­la­tion (over the age of 60) stands at 16 per cent or 229,000 cit­i­zens. By 2025, this co­hort will in­crease to 17 per cent.

Rouse said so­ci­ety once had re­spect and com­pas­sion for the el­der­ly.

“But that is gone. Now we are be­gin­ning to see the im­po­tence in the pow­ers that be to re­al­ly get a grip on this,” she lament­ed.

She said it is in­cum­bent on com­mu­ni­ties to step up and take charge.

“There is no safe place. When these crim­i­nals com­mit these acts, they are not feel­ing what we are feel­ing. That to me is the more dan­ger­ous thing we have to look at as a so­ci­ety. Where are we go­ing in this? Where are all these guns and am­mu­ni­tion com­ing from? These young crim­i­nals can’t even con­trol the guns they are us­ing . . . and are tak­ing in­no­cent lives.”

Rouse said there is no quick fix to this prob­lem.

“So, if we ain’t reach rock bot­tom yet and there is more to come with this crea­ture call man, can you imag­ine where we are go­ing?” she asked

Bur­glar­ies and rob­beries (Put in box)

Sta­tis­tics from the TTPS web­site showed that be­tween Jan­u­ary 1 and May 31 there were 530 bur­glar­ies and break-ins com­pared to the 655 for the same pe­ri­od last year.

A to­tal of 890 rob­beries were re­port­ed be­tween Jan­u­ary and May com­pared to 865 for the cor­re­spond­ing pe­ri­od last year.

Sur­vivors of re­cent home in­va­sions: (Put in box)

Waller­field pig farmer Wayne Bowen, 69, was hogtied, beat­en with a met­al pot, sprayed with in­sec­ti­cide and set on fire for $5,500 and a gold ring by armed gun­men who in­vad­ed his home a year ago.

In April, Rasheed Ghany, 70, and his 64-year-old wife Rashee­da were beat­en and tor­ment­ed for 30 min­utes in­side their Aranguez home by gun-tot­ing ban­dits who robbed them of $21,200 in cash, jew­el­ry, clothes, bot­tles of Hen­nessy and cell phones.

An 87-year-old woman in south Trinidad was al­leged­ly raped, bug­gered and robbed of $2,000 in cash by a 24-year-old man who was lat­er ar­rest­ed and t de­nied bail when he ap­peared be­fore Princes Town Mag­is­trate In­di­ra Misir-Go­sine.

Se­cu­ri­ty and safe­ty tips (Put in Box)

- In­vest in CCTV cam­eras and mo­tion sen­sor lights

- Keep emer­gency num­bers close to your phone.

- Use an air horn if your home is be­ing bur­glar­ized

- En­sure your mo­bile de­vice is ful­ly charged

- Se­cure win­dows and doors be­fore go­ing to bed

- Place house keys on a rack that is eas­i­ly ac­ces­si­ble

- Stag­ger bank­ing hours