Grandmother died of gunshot wound --Dr Mootoo
Killer, Raul Herod, and a little girl were the only two persons in the Buxton bloodbath who were burnt alive while bleeding from gunshot wounds, according to the results of post mortem examinations carried out on the eight bodies. The autopsies which were performed by Government Forensic Pathologist, Dr Leslie Mootoo, on Friday, revealed that the other six persons who perished in the bloodbath died of gunshot wounds before being engulfed in the flames. Herod, operations supervisor of Securicor and of 121 Side Line Dam, Buxton, slaughtered seven members of his family, including his mother and two of his children, before setting the family house on fire and shooting himself. The post mortem results disprove earlier suspicions that Herod's grandmother, Angela, was not shot but died as a result of burns. Dr Mootoo said all three of the elderly women in the massacre--Herod's grandmother, his mother Shirley Cole, and his aunt Patricia Harris--perished as a result of gunshot wounds. Dr Mootoo told Stabroek News that it was found that Herod was alive when he was being burnt, which means that both the fire and the gunshot wounds killed him. His 15-year-old nephew, Erwin, who was found outside in the yard after the killings, died as a result of a gunshot wound which penetrated his left lung, Dr Mootoo revealed. It was not clear whether it was Herod's daughter, Adele, or his niece, Jonelle, who perished as a result of both gunshots and fire. But Rodel, 17, Herod's son, died as a result of gunshot wounds before being burnt, according to his autopsy. (ALIM HASSIM) 
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