Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

The com­mon-law hus­band of the Princes Town moth­er of two Mala Boodram who was sav­age­ly beat­en to death by a rel­a­tive wants the sus­pect to face the full brunt of the law.

Den­nis Koat broke down in tears yes­ter­day as he re­called the tor­ture his wife en­dured at the hands of the 31-year-old sus­pect who had trapped them in their home at Cleghorn Vil­lage in Princes Town since Sun­day evening.

He said the sus­pect tried to set the house on fire more than once and be­gan beat­ing Boodram mer­ci­less­ly from Sun­day night in­to Mon­day morn­ing. When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the home yes­ter­day, homi­cide of­fi­cers were tak­ing a state­ment from him.

In a brief in­ter­view, 57-year-old Koat de­scribed his com­mon-law wife of 34 years as a warm and lov­ing per­son.

Koat, who is still re­cov­er­ing from hav­ing gall­blad­der surgery two months ago, broke down in tears as he re­called the hor­ri­fy­ing or­deal. He ad­mit­ted that pre­vi­ous­ly the sus­pect had beat­en him and had vi­o­lent out­bursts to­wards them, but he nev­er made a po­lice re­port.

“He hit me up sev­er­al times on my head, cuff me up, kick me up and I nev­er make no re­port in good mind. He nev­er hit my wife.”

The fa­ther of two ad­mit­ted that his wife told him a cou­ple of months ago that she was afraid that the sus­pect would phys­i­cal­ly at­tack them. Re­call­ing the events lead­ing up to his wife’s mur­der, he said they had gone to the mar­ket, and on their way back home, the sus­pect “bul­lied” his wife for $500.

He said she worked in a roti shop and re­cent­ly got paid.

Koat said the sus­pect had dis­con­nect­ed the in­ter­net, which they need­ed to make calls on What­sApp. The sus­pect was stay­ing down­stairs, so she went to find out why he dis­con­nect­ed the in­ter­net and knocked on the door.

Koat said he was up­stairs when he heard them “talk­ing loud,” then some­time lat­er, around 4 pm, the sus­pect came up­stairs. “He come up­stairs about 4 o’clock and he closed the two front doors and the one piece of couch he pull it to block the door. He sit down there like Rawan, so we can’t es­cape. We can’t do any­thing, and he start from there.”

He said the sus­pect then tried to set the house on fire. “He take up rags to catch up the gas tank. He throw it. He take them old mod­el lamp and he fling it and when he pelt it, pitch oil fall.”

Lat­er that evening, he said, the rel­a­tive took them to a back room. “And when the night come, he bring the gas tank in­side the room to catch it up. I keep mov­ing the cloth. He want to catch up the cur­tain and the gas tank right there.”

He said the sus­pect start­ed punch­ing, slap­ping and kick­ing Boodram and ac­cused her of not lik­ing any of his girl­friends. Koat said he begged him to stop beat­ing her, but he threat­ened him, and he was afraid that he would have suf­fered the same fate. “I right there, and I can’t do any­thing be­cause I sick and I small.”

As he broke down in tears, Koat lament­ed that the beat­ing went on “whole night till the morn­ing,” but he couldn’t help her.

“She was telling him to be­have, be­have and I feel­ing sor­ry. I sit down there ... poor woman, whole night.”

Koat said the moth­er of two loved the sus­pect, but he showed her no mer­cy.

“In the back room, he slam she on the ground, and he kick she up like a foot­ball. When she go to get up he car­ry she back down. He’s a mur­der­er. He want­ed to kill she.”

Af­ter Boodram was dead, the sus­pect told rel­a­tives that she had suf­fered a heart at­tack, but when the rel­a­tives and po­lice ar­rived on Mon­day, they saw bruis­es on her body. Koat said the sus­pect be­gan ex­pe­ri­enc­ing men­tal health is­sues af­ter he hit his head more than ten years ago.

He was an out­pa­tient of the psy­chi­atric clin­ic at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal and Princes Town Health Fa­cil­i­ty.

How­ev­er, he said about two or three months ago the sus­pect stopped tak­ing his med­ica­tion and evict­ed his (Koat) son, who lived down­stairs with his fam­i­ly. The sus­pect then moved down­stairs. He was em­ployed at the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty but had not worked for some time, but was ex­pect­ed to re­turn to work yes­ter­day.

Afraid that if the sus­pect is re­leased, he will at­tack him again, he said the po­lice should charge him with mur­der. He said Boodram, who suf­fered from di­a­betes, had bruis­es all over her body.

Koat said they were in­volved in an ac­ci­dent with a fire truck some time ago, and the court mat­ter was ex­pect­ed to be con­clud­ed soon, and they were ex­pect­ing com­pen­sa­tion. He said they were go­ing to use that mon­ey to get mar­ried.

Koat ad­vised peo­ple with loved ones with men­tal health is­sues to en­sure they get med­ical treat­ment. “Take care of their men­tal chil­dren. You make chil­dren, but you don’t make their minds.”

The sus­pect re­mained in cus­tody last evening. An au­top­sy is ex­pect­ed to be done to­day at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre in Port of Spain.