The sound of her son’s screams as a car ploughed into him along the Solomon Hochoy highway on Easter Sunday night, continues to haunt pensioner Lutchmie Gokool. The distraught woman says she does not know how she will be able to face the future knowing that her youngest child, Anil Gokool, 32, was dead. Police said Gokool, Anil and his brother Videsh Gokool, 37, were returning to their Concord Road, La Romaine home around 7.30 pm after attending prayer service when tragedy struck. Gokool said while driving on the highway, the right front tyre became flat.
The brothers stopped on the grassy verge off the shoulder of the south-bound carriageway of the highway to change the tyre, close to the Freeport Overpass. “I made sure to tell my son to pull off the highway. A police car later pulled up to the back of us and they began giving us some light to change the flat,” Gokool recalled. Videsh said while changing the tyre, a loud collision occurred and two cars careened off the highway. A witness told police that a marked police car was speeding down the highway and swerved in front of a female motorist.
The witness said she lost control and slammed into the back of another car which spun out of control and struck the Gokool brothers. “I saw the cars coming at us and I called out to Anil. The first car hit me on my legs and I started to spin. I got back up but not Anil. He never moved,” Videsh recalled. “I feel as if I am living a second life,” Videsh added in a quiet voice. Gokool said the brothers did everything together. “Anywhere I go they would go with me. I could not have asked for better sons,” Gokool wept. She said Anil worked at RPL Printery at Gulf View, La Romaine.
Her eldest son Rajesh said he wanted Police Commissioner Stephen Williams to launch an investigation into the death. “Sometimes these police officers take unnecessary risks on the road. A witness who was driving behind the cars saw everything and came to us this morning to say that the police car pulled directly to the back of another car and scared the driver. This is what caused my brother’s death,” Rajesh said.