Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

De­spite wit­ness­ing her par­ents’ bru­tal mur­ders, a 19-year-old woman stood strong dur­ing their fu­ner­al yes­ter­day, vow­ing not to be over­come by grief.

She de­liv­ered the eu­lo­gy for her par­ents at the Our La­dy of Guadalupe RC Church, a short dis­tance from her Pe­nal Rock Road home, show­ing re­mark­able re­silience and com­po­sure.

Short­ly be­fore 3 am last Mon­day, she was awak­ened by loud ex­plo­sions and found her fa­ther, Shaf­feak “Sham­boy” Vial­va, 52, sit­ting in a pool of blood out­side his bed­room. A man was re­port­ed­ly at the door­way to her par­ents’ bed­room, re­peat­ed­ly de­mand­ing mon­ey from her moth­er, Babi­ta Vial­va. The in­trud­er briefly or­dered the teenag­er back to her room, and short­ly af­ter­ward, she heard more gun­shots and dis­cov­ered her moth­er dead.

Friends and neigh­bours de­scribed the cou­ple as “good” and kind peo­ple—sen­ti­ments echoed by their daugh­ter, whose name has been with­held for her pro­tec­tion. Stand­ing alone at the podi­um, she thanked all who at­tend­ed to ho­n­our “two ex­tra­or­di­nary peo­ple.”

Cred­it­ing her par­ents’ love and strength for shap­ing her life, she said: “From the day I was born, they sac­ri­ficed to en­sure I had every­thing I need­ed. I will not stay here and cry and grieve be­cause I know they are in a bet­ter place. I hope that all of you know that.”

Ap­plause echoed through the church as she spoke.

She re­count­ed her par­ents’ tire­less work eth­ic: “He would reach home at six, sev­en o’clock, and still go and do his me­chan­ic job, as every­one knows. My mom strug­gled. She built our house. So, I will not stand here and be a very sad sto­ry … That’s all I can say be­cause I am proud of them and I am go­ing to be strong for them. They pre­pared me for this mo­ment in every way pos­si­ble.” She de­scribed her moth­er as the heart of the fam­i­ly and her fa­ther as its an­chor.

“We will miss them both deeply—Mom’s bright joy and Dad’s qui­et, strong love—but they will re­main with us in every mem­o­ry, every les­son, and in every part of who we are. Their spir­its live on through us. To­geth­er for­ev­er,” she said.

The cou­ple was in­terred at the Four Miles Pe­nal Rock Road Ceme­tery. Homi­cide de­tec­tives have not yet de­ter­mined a mo­tive for the killings, and no ar­rests have been made.