SOLDIER KILLS TEENAGER

KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

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A Fyz­abad moth­er is call­ing for a full probe af­ter her son was killed by a sol­dier dur­ing a joint po­lice/army raid at their home on Wednes­day.

“Oh God, they did not have to kill him like that,” Vanes­sa Ma­haraj cried yes­ter­day, af­ter Aaron “Kalon­ji” An­der­son, 19, was shot dead dur­ing the raid on their Del­hi Road, Fyz­abad, home.

A blood-smeared trail that ran from the up­stairs bath­room, down the stairs, across the yard and in­to the road re­mained a re­minder for the fam­i­ly of the dead­ly or­deal that oc­curred on Wednes­day af­ter­noon. The fam­i­ly fol­lowed the smear and said it shows how he was dragged out of the house, care­less­ly and in­hu­mane­ly, af­ter he was shot.

It was a hard morn­ing for Ma­haraj, 37.

Dur­ing the in­ter­view, she broke down, scream­ing, “Oh God, they are ly­ing.”

Her hus­band, Kay­o­de Valen­tine, Aaron’s step­fa­ther, strug­gled to con­sole her.

Po­lice re­ports claim of­fi­cers from the Home In­va­sion Team, ac­com­pa­nied by mem­bers of the T&T De­fence Force, ar­rived at about 4.27 pm on Wednes­day to ex­e­cute a war­rant for arms and am­mu­ni­tion. They said the breach team en­coun­tered An­der­son up­stairs, and he point­ed a firearm at them. Fear­ing for their lives, they said a De­fence Force sergeant fired one round from his G36 ri­fle, strik­ing An­der­son in the head. The weapon fell from his hand, po­lice said, and was found to be a loaded Glock pis­tol.

An­der­son was rushed to the Point Fortin Hos­pi­tal, where he was pro­nounced dead at 5.06 pm.

Crime scene in­ves­ti­ga­tors re­cov­ered a Glock 19 with a mag­a­zine and 15 rounds of 9mm am­mu­ni­tion, along with one spent 5.56 shell, in the house.

The po­lice re­port did not say what led of­fi­cers to the house, or how long they re­mained.

Ma­haraj was not home at the time. She had left around 3 pm with her hus­band and their chil­dren. On the way back, heavy traf­fic made her un­easy. As they neared the hill, they heard that shots had been fired at their house. Valen­tine said Ma­haraj jumped from the car and ran when they saw po­lice at the house.

Ma­haraj yes­ter­day told Guardian Me­dia that what she knows of the in­ci­dent came from neigh­bours and rel­a­tives. Every­one else in the house was down­stairs when of­fi­cers took her el­dest son up­stairs, she claimed. One neigh­bour, who did not want to be named, told her of­fi­cers rushed the back door and dragged him in by his hair. Neigh­bours, she claimed, said they heard him plead­ing for his life be­fore the gun­shots. She claimed he was then dragged through the liv­ing room and in­to a wait­ing van.

“They ex­e­cut­ed him. They couldn’t lock him up,” she said.

The fam­i­ly al­so al­leged that an 18-year-old rel­a­tive who wit­nessed the in­ci­dent was pushed to the floor and had her phone thrown away. Valen­tine said An­der­son’s girl­friend and an­oth­er mi­nor were al­so in the house.

Ma­haraj fur­ther claimed that one of An­der­son’s rel­a­tives di­rect­ed po­lice to the home.

Valen­tine claimed he was al­so beat­en out­side the gate when he tried to tell of­fi­cers he lived there. He said of­fi­cers or­dered him to leave and he could not even take out his phone. He said po­lice re­mained at the house for more than six hours search­ing for a gun, even look­ing in the roof, and in­sist­ed there was no weapon in the home.

“I know in this house here, it had no gun. I am sure about that,” Valen­tine said.

He ques­tioned why the fam­i­ly was nev­er shown a firearm.

“If all they say is they found a gun in this house, aren’t I en­ti­tled to see the firearm?”

The fam­i­ly, though, did not claim An­der­son was blame­less. Ma­haraj said he was no saint, got caught up with the wrong peo­ple and had been ar­rest­ed and charged be­fore. Valen­tine said he had known An­der­son since he was small and nev­er saw him as that kind of young man. But, the fam­i­ly said noth­ing he did jus­ti­fied how he died.

Now, the fam­i­ly says, they are afraid. They al­lege po­lice have warned them to stay silent and fear reprisals if they speak out.

The Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty (PCA) has ex­pressed con­cern over 15 fa­tal po­lice-in­volved shoot­ing in­ci­dents record­ed be­tween Au­gust 1 and Oc­to­ber 28, in­volv­ing 19 vic­tims.

In a state­ment yes­ter­day, the PCA said the fre­quen­cy of the in­ci­dents with­in such a short pe­ri­od de­mand­ed at­ten­tion, ac­count­abil­i­ty and ac­tion.

A to­tal of 48 peo­ple have been killed in po­lice-led law en­force­ment ac­tiv­i­ty so far this year.

The au­thor­i­ty stressed that every use of lethal force by po­lice re­quired in­de­pen­dent scruti­ny, in­clud­ing an ex­am­i­na­tion of whether the force used was nec­es­sary, pro­por­tion­ate and in ac­cor­dance with the law. As an in­de­pen­dent in­ves­tiga­tive body, the PCA said it was com­mit­ted to in­ves­ti­gat­ing mat­ters thor­ough­ly, im­par­tial­ly, and with­out fear, favour or prej­u­dice.

It said pub­lic con­fi­dence de­pend­ed on cred­i­ble and rig­or­ous in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to deaths in­volv­ing po­lice and reaf­firmed its com­mit­ment to en­sur­ing such in­ci­dents re­ceived in­de­pen­dent scruti­ny.

Po­lice said in­quiries in­to the lat­est in­ci­dent are con­tin­u­ing. Guardian Me­dia reached out to the De­fence Force for com­ment and is await­ing one.