Sascha Wil­son

Rel­a­tives, friends and vil­lagers con­front­ed the po­lice yes­ter­day dur­ing a fiery protest in Moru­ga call­ing for jus­tice for Vern­rick Hudlin, who was fa­tal­ly shot by an off-du­ty po­lice­man on Sat­ur­day.

Emo­tions flared as tyres burned across Moru­ga Road, St Mary’s Vil­lage, near Gomez Trace, where Hudlin, fond­ly known as My­man, was killed by a bul­let to the chest.

“We want jus­tice! We want jus­tice,” shout­ed pro­test­ers who were wear­ing face masks and dis­play­ing plac­ards.

As Sgt John and oth­er of­fi­cers from the Bar­rack­pore Po­lice Sta­tion ar­rived on the scene, the pro­test­ers did not back down. They called for the ar­rest of the shoot­er, who lives in the Gomez Trace com­mu­ni­ty in the near­by HDC Ridge View de­vel­op­ment.

Hudlin, 54, a watch­man at the Gomez Trace Waste­water Treat­ment Plant, al­so lived on the com­pound lo­cat­ed with­in the Ridge View de­vel­op­ment.

Video footage of the in­ci­dent shows Hudlin walk­ing along the road around 4.50 pm when a blue car sud­den­ly swerves in front of him. Hudlin walks up to the dri­ver’s win­dow and with­in sec­onds rais­es his cut­lass. He was shot and im­me­di­ate­ly fell to the ground. The dri­ver and an­oth­er oc­cu­pant then pick him up and place him in the ve­hi­cle be­fore dri­ving off. Hudlin, the fa­ther of a teenage boy, was pro­nounced dead on ar­rival at the Princes Town Dis­trict Fa­cil­i­ty.

The po­lice of­fi­cer lat­er claimed he had an al­ter­ca­tion with Hudlin, who at­tacked him with a cut­lass. How­ev­er, res­i­dents and rel­a­tives claimed that be­fore the in­ci­dent, Hudlin would have spo­ken to the of­fi­cer about dump­ing de­bris in front of the treat­ment plant.

PRO of Ridge View Com­mu­ni­ty Group, Ever­ald Dy­er, said he saw Hudlin ar­gu­ing with two po­lice­men ear­li­er in the day and he lat­er told Hudlin to go home and for­get about it.

“I am will­ing to tes­ti­fy that he did noth­ing. Mr Gary Grif­fith and In­sp Alexan­der, jus­tice must be served. We don’t want that po­lice­man to be liv­ing in our com­mu­ni­ty any­more. We want him locked up. If that does not hap­pen, we will walk for jus­tice,” Dy­er said.

An­oth­er res­i­dent, An­to­nio Pit­man, added, “The video is show­ing dif­fer­ent­ly. We want an­swers. Why the man is not locked up right now? All of us are un­com­fort­able liv­ing with this man in­side here (the com­mu­ni­ty).”

Hudlin’s friend Mary Dy­er said he was loved by the com­mu­ni­ty.

She com­plained, “The po­lice was dump­ing rub­bish on the man’s work­site and the man com­plained to the po­lice as a neigh­bour­hood watch. He should of nev­er killed we broth­er. It is wrong. Jus­tice must be served to­day.”

She said res­i­dents were now liv­ing in fear.

“We want the po­lice of­fi­cer to be ar­rest­ed and brought to jus­tice for killing an in­no­cent man who has done him noth­ing. A good man loved by the whole com­mu­ni­ty.”

Res­i­dent Ian Ali said Hudlin was a good and gen­er­ous per­son.

“I am hurt and dis­turbed. It was an ex­e­cu­tion.”

Sgt John ex­plained to the pro­test­ers that while he un­der­stood they were ag­griev­ed, they were in the breach of the COVID-19 reg­u­la­tions and oth­er laws. He told them that an ac­tive in­ves­ti­ga­tion was on­go­ing and he would an­swer their ques­tions once the de­bris was cleared off the road­way.

“Al­lyuh com­ing to ap­ply the law for peo­ple who are will­ing to grieve for a man who was good. Al­lyuh come to tell we don’t stand up for we rights,” lament­ed Hudlin’s younger broth­er Justin Di­az, who com­plained that the po­lice were yet to con­tact the fam­i­ly about the in­ci­dent.

Di­az al­so said they did not even know where his broth­er’s body was be­ing kept.

The de­bris was on­ly cleared af­ter an­oth­er of­fi­cer ex­plained to them that one of the com­muters stuck in the traf­fic caused by the road­block was a woman tak­ing her sick daugh­ter to seek med­ical treat­ment.

The Po­lice Com­plaint Au­thor­i­ty has al­so launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent. A PCA re­lease stat­ed, “The pub­lic is as­sured that due process shall be fol­lowed at all stages of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion. In this re­gard, the PCA will not ex­press any view pri­or to any de­ter­mi­na­tion by a court of law as same may be tan­ta­mount to at­tempt­ing to in­ter­fere with due process and the course of nat­ur­al jus­tice.”

The PCA re­quest­ed that wit­ness­es or per­sons with in­for­ma­tion on the in­ci­dent con­tact 226-4722 email at in­fo@pca.org.tt. The au­thor­i­ty said all in­for­ma­tion pro­vid­ed would be kept con­fi­den­tial.