An eyewitness to the killing of three men, including a Jamaican national and a murder suspect, says she fears for her life after witnessing what she describes as executions carried out by men who appear to be members of the T&T Regiment.
The young mother of two, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said she was with Dillon Skeete, 30; Joel Tash, 22; and Jamaican Sherwin “Crime” Thomas when they were killed. She said she was with nine men liming near Skeete’s office at Desperlie Crescent when two vehicles, a police vehicle followed by a Nissan X-Trail, drove past. She said she saw the drivers of the two vehicles speak briefly before the police vehicle drove away.
She said the next thing she heard was: “Ay police! Everybody go up on the wall!” She said a gun was pointed at her chest by one of three masked men who came out of the X-Trail. The woman said when she asked for identification she was told: “It have no girl thing here. I will kill you.”
She was then ordered to kneel. She said one of the masked men told her he knew her face and could come back to harm her. She said she heard the masked men speaking roughly to the three men who had been made to kneel down with their hands in the air. The woman said one of the masked men stepped away from the group to answer a call, then returned and shot Skeete, signalling the others to “spray down” (shoot) the others.
The woman said when she heard the gunfire, she ran. She said she narrowly escaped being shot and as she fled she saw Thomas, an actor who had come to T&T to film a movie, gasping for breath. “They does always come and kill people in here and get away with it,” the woman said. “This is not the first time. That was execution. I must be frightened after I nearly see death. The woman said she believed the masked men to be soldiers because of the heavy artillery they used.
“Oh no, it wasn’t bad boys. The van went in and come out and people see the van. I hear the shots,” she said. “I had to band up my knees because when I heard the shots I dropped to my knees and bawl.” “Tash’s father Noel, who spoke with reporters at the Forensic Science Centre, said his son would have celebrated his 23rd birthday next month and was an aspiring policeman. He said his son was killed for visiting friends.
“He used to go and visit relatives in Laventille because he moved out and I always warned him about going Laventille in the night,” Tash said, adding that his son had signed up to become a Special Reserved Police officer but after he became ill for one week he had to restart the process. Skeete’s relatives, who were also at the Forensic Science Centre, claimed he had been hunted down by soldiers and eventually killed because he was considered a suspect in the June 29 killing of Lance Cpl Kayode Thomas.