Ria Husain-Thompson, the mother of teenager Maria Paul who has been missing since September 18, has to wait on DNA results to confirm that human remains found in a shallow grave in Wallerfield on Tuesday are her daughter. However, she said the physical pain she felt last weekend was enough of a sign.
Husain-Thompson spoke with reporters at her home at Plantation Road, Valencia, yesterday hours after she submitted DNA samples for testing. The mother of two said the body was badly decomposed and there was very little that could be used to identify the corpse by way of clothing, jewellery or tattoos, so she listened to her heart as any mother would.
“A slipper that I bought for her, their description of it was the same, so I know it was her and her foot was very tiny,” she said.
Paul had been living with her boyfriend and his father at By-Pass Road, Arima, for the past 15 months. Her mother said she was happy and appeared to have no problems.
Husain-Thompson said she last spoke with Paul on September 12 and when she attempted to contact her the following day, calls to her cell phone went unanswered.
“I found it weird that she wasn’t answering which was worrying as she was always quick to answer when I call,” she said.
She continued calling for three consecutive days.
Husain-Thompson said two days after Paul was last heard from, she started to feel sick.
“I started to feel hurt, like something is wrong,” she said.
She decided to go and look for Paul on September 16 but was surprised when Paul’s boyfriend visited her.
“He came to my residence early on Monday morning (September 16), and told me Maria had run away, that she was no longer with him or staying with him,” she recalled.
Husain-Thompson said she dismissed reports that her daughter had moved to a farm in Brazil, Las Lomas, because “she would never do such a thing.”
She said she was given Paul’s belongings with an assurance that money and any other assistance would be provided once she was found.
Husain-Thompson said her daughter ran away from home when she was 16 and was later found at the home of a school friend in Brazil.
“Maria promised me that she would never do this again, like run away, and she would never do or say the things she said to me in the past so we worked out that, so that is why when he said to me that Maria ran away again, it was unbelievable to me,” she admitted.
She said she had a special bond with her daughter and felt the physical pain she had suffered in the end.
Fighting back tears, she said: “I felt like someone was hurting me inside and I was wondering what this feeling was. I didn’t know, I didn’t understand. I know something was wrong with Maria and I was just praying.”
Remains believed to be Paul’s were found in a shallow grave at Babwah Trace, Wallerfield around 1.10 pm on Monday by members of the Hunters Search and Rescue led by Shamshudeen Ayub.
The grave was near an unfinished concrete house under an area of burnt debris and disturbed soil.
Husain-Thompson said although Paul was “a very nice person, very friendly,” she did not have many friends and kept to herself.
“My daughter did not deserve that. No one deserves such a death by wicked people out here. This was very wicked, to know the amount of things they did to just one person, it is too much,” she said.
