Senior Reporter
sascha.wilson@guardian.co.tt
After being hijacked, brutally beaten, stabbed repeatedly and left for dead in an isolated area in South Oropouche on Monday, a taxi driver crawled for hours before he found help, more than 24 hours later on Tuesday afternoon.
Doctors had to put 38-year-old Leslie Alexander in an induced coma as they attended to him at the San Fernando General Hospital.
His sister thanked God that Alexander was alive and credited his strong spiritual beliefs for his survival.
“My brother is a strong, praying soul,” said Stephanie Alexander during a telephone interview hours after her brother was found by a female passer-by near the Silver Stream Bridge off the highway.
She said he was brutally beaten on his head, suffered a deep gash to his neck and had 40 to 50 small stab wounds about his body.
Stephanie said her brother began working the Cocoyea, Ste Madeleine and Pleasantville routes three months ago. He previously worked in the construction sector.
The sister believes Alexander was lured from his Cocoyea Village home on Monday around 5.12 pm under the pretext of a hired job.
Instead, two men held him up at gunpoint and took him to an isolated area in South Oropouche.
“They carried him in a container and beat him. He was stabbed, beaten with gun butt ... They left him for dead.”
She said her brother’s attackers stole his jewelry, cellphone and money, and escaped in his Toyota Corolla.
She said relatives realised something was wrong around 7 pm on Monday, when calls to Alexander’s phone were declined. When they received a text message stating that he could not speak because he had a toothache, they knew someone was pretending to be Alexander.
“He would usually send a voice note,” she said.
She then remotely shut down her brother’s GPS-equipped car, which was later found in La Romain.
“Then we saw another text message from his phone saying that he is on his way. But how could he be on his way when the car was shut down?” she said.
According to the GPS read-out, the attackers went driving through Oropouche, Fyzabad, Siparia, Woodland and Gasparillo.
Around 1 pm, a female motorist found Alexander and called the police, who notified his wife.
“Where they left him, there are no houses, an isolated area. He could not walk, he crawled out, dragged himself out. He was muddy and dirty when we found him. He came out to this bridge entrance hoping someone would see him. He tried to drag himself out to get rescued,” she said.
A man has since been detained for the kidnapping and attack on Alexander.
His sister, Stephanie, said the crime situation has left her frustrated.
“I am tired and fed-up. I can sell all of my possessions and leave here,” she said.
She said her brother’s brain was swollen and doctors had to drain fluid from his lungs because of the injuries.
