As news spread of the bru­tal killing of Am­i­na Mo­hammed, Cou­va res­i­dents ex­pressed shock and fear about the state of crime in T&T.

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the scene, most hous­es were shut but res­i­dents ex­pressed sad­ness over Mo­hammed’s demise say­ing she was a kind and gen­er­ous per­son. The thieves killed Mo­hammed with her own kitchen knife af­ter steal­ing $10,000 in cash and jew­ellery.

Chair­man of the Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, Ryan Ram­per­sad, de­scribed the crime as a glar­ing re­minder of the re­gion’s se­cu­ri­ty chal­lenges.

“The at­tack­ers, armed and ag­gres­sive, mur­dered an el­der­ly woman while her hus­band, bound and in­jured, was un­able to stop the crime. This crime high­lights the grow­ing con­cerns over se­cu­ri­ty with­in the Mu­nic­i­pal­i­ty of Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro and calls for im­me­di­ate ac­tion to ad­dress ris­ing crime rates,” Ram­per­sad said.

He called on the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice to in­crease pa­trols and re­open the Bras­so and San Rafael po­lice sta­tions.

“The res­i­dents of Cou­va and all of Trinidad and To­ba­go de­serve to feel safe in their homes. The au­thor­i­ties must act swift­ly to re­store peace and se­cu­ri­ty in the re­gion.”

Cou­va North MP Ravi Rati­ram said cit­i­zens are liv­ing in con­stant fear.

“Cit­i­zens can­not sleep com­fort­ably at night be­cause every noise they jump up and look out, and we have a Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty who is sleep­ing on the job,” Rati­ram said.

Cou­va South MP Rudranath In­dars­ingh de­scribed Mo­hammed’s death as hor­rif­ic.

“Ms Mo­hammed, a con­stituent of mine, at the age of 68 years old, was grotesque­ly killed at her home in Lisas Gar­dens, Cou­va. By all in­di­ca­tions, she was a de­vot­ed sis­ter in Is­lam, a lov­ing moth­er, and a well-loved mem­ber of her com­mu­ni­ty,” In­dars­ingh said.

He added, “I can­not be­gin to imag­ine the im­mense grief, pain, loss, trau­ma, and oth­er in­de­scrib­able feel­ings be­ing felt by Sis­ter Mo­hammed’s loved ones. It is de­spi­ca­ble that while Ms Mo­hammed joins the num­ber of se­nior cit­i­zens who have been killed as tar­gets of crim­i­nals and ban­dits, Dr Kei­th Row­ley en­deav­ours to pro­tect cit­i­zens from his po­lit­i­cal op­po­nents rather than crim­i­nals.”

Mo­hammed’s son, Ah­mad Saleem Mo­hammed, ex­pressed frus­tra­tion at the state of crime.