By Andrew Carmichael
A Community Policing Group (CPG) member on the East Bank of Berbice (EBB) is now in Police custody assisting with investigations into the wounding of a Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) labourer.
The incident occurred on Saturday evening at Edinburgh, EBB.
The injured man, Basdeo Sahadeo, 25, of Edinburgh Village, was treated at the New Amsterdam Hospital where he received a number of stitches for seven stab wounds and four lacerations.
Speaking with this publication, Sahadeo said that about 22:00h on Saturday, the CPG officer attacked him and then his 16-year-old son allegedly joined in. The incident was reportedly witnessed by several villagers who claimed that the CPG officer, a licensed firearm holder, also threatened to shoot them.
According to Sahadeo, he was in the village earlier in the evening and was told that some boys were waiting to beat him. He explained that two months ago he had lent his bicycle to a boy who was on an errand and it was later discovered that the boy had tendered a counterfeit $1000 bill.
Sahadeo said he was being accused of ‘switching’ the money when he loaned the bicycle. “So I go to the boy and ask him what is the problem and by the time I reach the big man [CPG officer] reach at the back here and he tell me, ‘Look how you all could get you all dead,’ so I ask what I do.”
Sahadeo said he was verbally abused and then lashed in his head with a glass which his attacker had in his hand at the time, causing blood to run down his face. “So I tell him that he is a big man, I didn’t come to fight…then he start to punch me, and I exchange cuffs with him and he fall down.”
Several villagers related the same story.
Meanwhile, Sahadeo’s mother, Camille Mendonza noted that threats from the CPG rank were also hurled at her. “When I turn and told him that I never expected that from him, he turn and said that he could shoot all of us.”
The villagers say the CPG officer is a licensed firearm holder.
Sahadeo also told this publication that the CPG rank held on to him and allowed his son to stab him in the chest.
Police took the CPG officer into custody, along with his son who should have been starting Fifth Form on Monday.
