Complaints were made to police, Securicor about Raul Herod's threats -Avril Herod reiterates By Courtney Jones Stabroek News July 24, 1999 Two weeks after the multiple killings and suicide at Buxton on the East Coast of Demerara that left eight dead, a child injured and a family house a pile of charred wood, there are still unanswered questions as to why action was not taken on reports of the killer's actions at home. Avril Herod, sister of Buxton multiple killer, Raul Herod, is still maintaining that seven members of her family died needlessly. She said the police and Securicor could have taken decisive action on the complaints made. Avril Herod's children, Jonelle, 11; and Erwin, 14, died in the early morning massacre that claimed the lives of 97-year-old Angela Herod, her daughters Patricia and Shirley and Rodel "Bobby" Herod and Adele Nandy Herod, children of the killer. Herod said that because of the pistol carried by her brother, the family took his threats during quarrels seriously. She told Stabroek News last week that after a number of serious quarrels at home in which her brother in some instances prominently displayed his pistol, a .32 Taurus automatic, she and her mother had reported Herod to policemen at the Vigilance Police Station. One neighbour told Stabroek News that in one instance when Herod had threatened his wife Denise, she had to hide in another neighbour's toilet and that police were also apprised of that development. "I have personally gone to the Vigilance Station to complain about (his) Raul Herod's behaviour and no police ever as far as I am aware ever spoke to him", Avril said. She said that the perception the family had was that because her brother was a former policeman, they were reluctant to take any action against one of their own. On two occasions when this newspaper visited the Vigilance Station, the officer in charge was not available to speak. However, media reports had quoted policemen from the station as denying that any reports were made by any members of the Herod family about Raul Herod's behaviour at any time. A source at police headquarters at Eve Leary said that any reports about Herod threatening his family, if received by policemen in the area, would have been investigated since that was standard police procedure. In any case, the source disclosed, all complaints would have been recorded in a complaints book also as a matter of standard police procedure. "If the police at Vigilance said that threats by Herod to his family were not reported to them, then it should be easy to establish the truth of that statement since it either would or would not be in the station's records", the source said. However, residents in the village have complained that calls to the station at times elicited the response that there were no ranks available at the station to send out. According to residents of the village, it was not that policemen on duty at the station were not willing to do their job, but that in many cases, men were just not available to carry out investigations. Avril had also said that she had spoken to the authorities at Securicor about her brother's behaviour at home. She told Stabroek News that in one particular instance she spoke to an official in the presence of her brother who flatly denied her allegations and threatened to sue her. Avril Herod, herself an employee of the company said she had expressed on behalf of the family, misgivings about her brother taking home a weapon in the light of his behaviour at home whenever there was a quarrel. However, officials of Securicor have consistently denied that any report was made to them about Raul Herod's relations with his family. There seems to be some reluctance on the part of the security company to come up with a definitive response as to whether indeed Herod had spoken to a top official of the company about her brother's attitude. Since last week, Stabroek News spoke to the operations manager of Securicor and was told to contact a director of Securicor, David Affonso. However, Affonso's secretary gave phone numbers to contact General Manager, Pauline Hamilton. Since Monday, however, efforts by this newspaper to reach Hamilton were either met with promises that she would return calls or that she was not available to speak to Stabroek News. A © page from: Guyana: Land of Six Peoples