by Ot­to Car­ring­ton

The fa­ther of the nine-year-old who was grazed on his face while dri­ving along South Main Road says his son is still in the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal and will un­der­go surgery soon.

The fa­ther who is at­tached to the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard and did not want to be iden­ti­fied along with his son de­nied that he was shot at Pen­ny­wise Plaza, La Ro­main but was shot while mak­ing his way home along the South­ern Main Road in the vicin­i­ty of Pond Street, La Ro­main.

The boy is a stu­dent at Siparia Ro­man Catholic Pri­ma­ry School.

"They were on the way to pick up from school and they came to San Fer­nan­do then they went to Pen­ny­wise and bought some stuff and were head­ing back home and they were in the vicin­i­ty of La Ro­main when they heard a loud ex­plo­sion and a bul­let en­tered the back glass it struck him. It grazed the dri­ver seat head­rest and ex­it­ed the front glass of the car," he said.

"They were pass­ing and they saw the po­lice con­don­ing off the area and then af­ter they heard gun­shots be­cause where they found the men, they were in the vicin­i­ty."

The fa­ther said that he was not with his wife and chil­dren but at home.

He ex­plained that around the time of the chase at 5.30 pm, they were in the vicin­i­ty of the coun­cil­lor's of­fice in La Ro­main in the vicin­i­ty of Pond Street.

"The sound of the gun­shots came from be­hind the ve­hi­cle and my son said that he heard gun­shots and he saw a flash and start­ed to feel blood run­ning down his face."

"I be­lieve that the bul­let may be from the friend­ly side be­cause these men they said had high-pow­ered ri­fles and his wound I think would have been worst. As a mem­ber of the De­fence Force for over 18 years deal­ing with crime and oth­er mat­ters and to see this hap­pen. I would nev­er think I would en­counter some­thing like this and for my nine-year-old. At this mo­ment he is trau­ma­tized along with my daugh­ter and wife," he said.

His fam­i­ly needs him to be strong at this time.

"The po­lice told my wife that she had to come back to the po­lice sta­tion to make an of­fi­cial re­port be­cause when she went to give the po­lice re­port of the in­ci­dent the first time. My wife was get­ting re­sis­tance and the of­fi­cers were stat­ing that our in­ci­dent was an­oth­er in­ci­dent and they did not even give her a re­ceipt and they told my wife to come back be­cause they were do­ing an in­ves­ti­ga­tion but I am con­cerned that an in­ves­ti­ga­tion will stop you from mak­ing a re­port or giv­ing a state­ment," he said.

He added that his son is in good spir­its and has asked to re­turn to school. He is try­ing to be brave and strong but he is in pain and the med­ica­tion is help­ing.

The nine-year-old fa­ther said that his son has stitch­es and is card­ed to do skin graphs on his face.