(Trinidad Guardian) Ravi Anthony was shot twice and one of his arms and legs were chopped off by his killers, who then tried to set his body afire before dumping it in a forested area in Sister’s Road, his autopsy has found.
Anthony, 34, a mason, was abducted on May 14 while walking along Mission Road, Freeport, with a male relative. He was returning to his Connector Drive, Nelson Road, Freeport home at the time.
Relatives now say Anthony was killed in retaliation for the January 3, 2017 murders of Elton Armorer, 35; Michael Kent Brown, 25 and Winston Edwards, 39, at Commonwealth Drive, Nelson Road, Freeport.
A family member had told the T&T Guardian earlier this week that other family members were living in fear after they received a menacing message several days after the abduction.
“Someone send a message that we would never see Ravi again and they would take out our family one by one,” the relative said.
On Sunday, a resident of Francis Trace, Sister’s Road, stumbled across the badly decomposed body of a man in some bushes on the side of the roadway.
Police contacted Anthony’s family on Monday to identify the body, but it was on Tuesday when relatives visited the Forensic Science Centre in St James that they confirmed it was Anthony.
In an interview yesterday, a female relative, who asked not to be identified, said because of the state of Anthony’s body the family will be having a closed casket funeral sometime later this week. Anthony was the eldest of his parents’ 12 children. She said the family was still reeling from the shock of the details of his gruesome murder.
“They wrapped his head in some clothes and tried to set him on fire…now we can’t even open the box (coffin), we have to put a picture of him on top of it. We can’t even buy a suit of clothes for Ravi to go home in,” she said.
“His father run out the mortuary crying when he see the condition of his son’s body. Right now nobody knows how to feel, we can’t even sleep.”
Initially, the family was unable to identify his body as the clothing he was wearing did not match those he was wearing when he abducted.
“Apparently he was wearing clothes my cousin sent for him from New York and they were not sure it was him.”
But the relative again said that Anthony was being falsely targeted as he had no connections to the January 3 triple murders.
“Those guys who got killed in January were warring with a lot of different people from outside. Ravi didn’t have anything to do with those murders. He even went into the police station and told them that he was being blamed but nothing ever came out of it.”
She described Anthony as a quiet person and said she does not understand why the family is being targeted.
“Some guys beat up one of his brothers earlier a few months ago and they chopped another brother too, we don’t know what to do because like they are not stopping.”
Freeport police confirmed that the body found was Anthony’s but said no motive has been determined.
A senior police officer said Anthony was not known to the police and had no criminal record.
