AN­NA-LISA PAUL

A mid-morn­ing mur­der in Tu­na­puna on Sat­ur­day left one man dead, while the in­tend­ed tar­get was able to es­cape un­scathed.

Valmi­ki Nar­ine, 49, was de­scribed by per­sons as a “qui­et” man who loved to drink his rum and lime.

The in­ci­dent oc­curred just be­fore 11 am, in front Dar­ryl’s Fa­mous Foods, St Vin­cent Street and East­ern Main Road, Tu­na­puna.  Ven­dors and shop­pers in the near­by Tu­na­puna Mar­ket were sent div­ing for cov­er when the shoot­ing oc­curred.

Mean­while, mo­torists stuck in the grid­lock traf­fic al­so were left con­fused as to how to pro­ceed, as many ex­pressed fear and shock over the brazen killing.

Re­ports in­di­cate the vic­tim had just be­gun eat­ing dou­bles when the gun­shots rang out.

It is be­lieved the man whom he had been stand­ing next to was the in­tend­ed tar­get, but he ran off.

Eye­wit­ness­es said as the vic­tim col­lapsed af­ter be­ing shot in the stom­ach, arm and head, the dou­bles he had been eat­ing be­gan to come through his nose and mouth.

The in­ci­dent left many in the im­me­di­ate vicin­i­ty shak­en, as they lament­ed the state of crime in the coun­try.

A 65-year-old woman who had been in the mar­ket op­po­site said, “It was fright­en­ing.”

Still shak­ing as she re­count­ed hear­ing the gun­shots which had sent her run­ning fur­ther in­to the mar­ket, the woman said ven­tur­ing out of her home didn’t make sense any­more.

She said, “They must have po­lice around.”

An el­der­ly man added, “Crime is a re­al bad thing now.”

He said, “Is a sad thing to know that a busy morn­ing like now...peo­ple, chil­dren pass­ing...any­body coul­da get shoot.”

“Crime is a thing that un­at­tend­ed. Deal with it. Peo­ple have to sit down and think about what they do­ing and put them­selves to­geth­er and put God in their mind,” he added.