Joshua Seemu­n­gal

Two years af­ter the dis­ap­pear­ance of Shan­ice Coop­er, then sev­en months preg­nant, 37-year-old Valen­tine Radix has been charged with her mur­der.

Radix, of Ca­roni Sa­van­nah Road, Char­lieville, was ar­rest­ed by of­fi­cers of the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions on Au­gust 23 af­ter new ev­i­dence sur­faced in the case. He was ques­tioned and then re­leased but over the week­end, Deputy Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions George Bus­by gave the go-ahead to charge him.

Radix, who was in a re­la­tion­ship with Coop­er, was sched­uled to ap­pear be­fore a Port-of-Spain mag­is­trate yes­ter­day.

On the morn­ing of Au­gust 28, 2019, Coop­er left her moth­er’s home at Boissierre Lane, Bel­mont, but nev­er re­turned. She was last seen by neigh­bours wait­ing near Nunes Gas Sta­tion in Bel­mont.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, Shan­ice’s moth­er, An­nette Philbert, was ini­tial­ly un­aware that Radix had been charged. Up­on hear­ing the news, she ex­pressed hap­pi­ness but de­clined fur­ther com­ment. She said she suf­fers too much when she has to speak about her on­ly child.

In the days and weeks since her niece’s dis­ap­pear­ance, Shan­ice’s aunt, Pauline Coop­er, nev­er gave up the fight for jus­tice. She said, fi­nal­ly, that fight has reaped re­wards.

“What a morn­ing to call me. We re­joice in Je­sus’ name. To­day, I feel so very, very elat­ed. Very elat­ed. You know the jour­ney to jus­tice has just start­ed. I have been pray­ing for this mo­ment and it was heard. This past week was hard.”

Sto­ries about Coop­er’s dis­ap­pear­ance have been fea­tured in the T&T Guardian news­pa­per, CNC3 News, as well as on CNC3’s in­ves­tiga­tive pro­gramme, Un­spun.

Pauline said keep­ing her niece’s sto­ry alive was cru­cial in as­sist­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tors with their case.

Shanice Cooper

“I had to, as you know, go to the news­pa­pers and dif­fer­ent me­dia out­lets and let her sto­ry be heard. You know, I nev­er tired of shar­ing her sto­ry. Let peo­ple nev­er for­get that a fam­i­ly mem­ber is miss­ing in the hope that some­body out there who knows some­thing will be moved by the per­sis­tence to con­vince them to speak,” she said.

“I was fear­less in my pur­suit for jus­tice for my niece be­cause I knew she de­served jus­tice and what was done to her was just not right.”

Shan­ice Coop­er was an em­ploy­ee of the Port Au­thor­i­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go. At the time of her dis­ap­pear­ance, she was sev­en months preg­nant. She was ex­pect­ing a boy.

“They were in the height of plan­ning the ba­by show­er. They even came up with a colour scheme for the ba­by show­er. And that same colour scheme would have been the colour of the clothes they were buy­ing for the ba­by,” her aunt, Pauline, said in a 2020 in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia.

“My prayer is that one of­fi­cer–like the ones you see in CSI–would nev­er lose in­ter­est in this case. I pray that they will con­tin­ue to in­ves­ti­gate it un­til all the lies are un­earthed, un­til jus­tice is served.”

In­ves­ti­ga­tions were su­per­vised by In­spec­tors Lynch and Jones of the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions Re­gion 1. Radix was charged by WPC Clin­ton.