Two men die in separate incidents
Security guard knifed, robber found dead
By Samantha Alleyne
Stabroek News
October 21, 2002
The police are investigating a shooting on Saturday night and a stabbing early yesterday morning which left two men dead.
Fifty-one-year-old security guard Roy Singh, of 52 West Ruimveldt Estate Housing Scheme, was found dead at his Mandela Avenue workplace with a stab wound to his neck. A twenty-four-year-old man, whose name police gave as Timothy Sampson but whose relatives said his name is Shawn St Hill, was found dead with gunshot wounds at the corner of Avenue of the Republic and Charlotte Street.
According to the police, St Hill, whose address was given as South Sophia, was among a group of men who attacked a policeman and two robbery victims. It is unclear who fired the shot/s that killed St Hill.
Singh, a father of two, was employed as a security guard at Agri Parts Machinery & Services on Mandela Avenue. One of his two sons, Ravindra Singh, told this newspaper that the family was awakened at around 2 am yesterday morning by the police along with a relative of his father's employer who informed them that their father had been killed.
According to Ravindra, on arrival at the scene he found his father dead on the stairs of the building with a stab wound to his neck and a pool of blood around him.
Stabroek News was told by a police source that the owner of the business was awakened by a noise and upon investigating he saw a person in the yard. The man, who is a licenced firearm holder, discharged a round but the person escaped by scaling the fence.
When he went downstairs he found Singh lying in a pool of blood.
The man's son said that his father was the holder of a `box hand' (a pool of money that several people contribute to) of around $25,000 which he had taken with him to work. However, when he was searched no money was found and it was assumed that whoever murdered him escaped with the cash.
Other than Ravindra, Singh has also left to mourn his other son Navindra and six grandchildren. The man lived with his two sons and had only started working on Mandela Avenue a few months prior to his death.
When Stabroek News visited the scene where he was murdered the building was locked and no one appeared to be at home. There were bloodstains in the yard.
A police press release on St Hill's death said that the man, who was on bail pending trial for robbery with aggravation, was found dead with gunshot wounds at the corner of Avenue of the Republic and Charlotte Street, shortly after an incident on Saturday night.
According to the release, the man along with a gang of about nine others attacked a plainclothes policeman who was accompanying two persons to the scene of an earlier robbery. The two persons had been robbed of a cellular phone, $20,000 and a handbag with several articles by five men on Longden and America Street.
The release added that the victims, a brother and sister, were on their way from Mahaicony to a wedding on the East Bank when they were robbed following which they made a report to the Brickdam Police Station.
A plainclothes rank accompanied them to the scene and on arrival the police and the victims were attacked by a group of about ten men armed men with knives, cutlasses and `Bass' (a noxious substance.) During the melee, the release said, several shots rang out and the group fled.
"Fortunately, the police and victims managed to avoid being hit," the release said.
It was shortly after this that St Hill's body was found and he reportedly had a tin of `Bass' in his possession. The release noted that St Hill was charged jointly with two others on October 3 with robbery with aggravation.
An aunt of the young man said yesterday that he was a bus conductor and she was not aware that he was involved in any criminal activity. She told Stabroek News that his mother said he left his Sophia home at around 8 p.m. on Saturday night and they later got the news about his death through some friends. She did not know under what circumstances her nephew was shot.