(Trinidad Guardian) Over a decade of physical and verbal confrontations between father and son came to an end on Sunday night when Sham Siewnarine was stabbed to death, as his mother told T&T Guardian, by his father.
The distraught woman was an eyewitness to the tragic confrontation that occurred in the home she shared with both men.
She said that Siewnarine, 28, was stabbed once in the chest. He died at his Gopee Trace, Penal home while she frantically awaited the arrival of an ambulance.
His father is a 60-year-old retiree.
Flora Siewnarine, 57, recounted the events leading up to her only son’s death during an interview with the T&T Guardian at her home yesterday.
She said she had celebrated Mother’s Day at her daughter’s Enterprise, Chaguanas home and returned to Penal around 9.30 pm, together with the older man.
“Both of us went by my daughter for the day and when we come home, he (Sham) was not home, he had gone out drinking all day with his friends,” Flora said.
“We went to sleep and Sham come home a little while later and start cussing and banging on the door.”
Fearful that her son would beat her and her husband for yet another time, Flora begged him not to answer to Sham’s taunts.
“I keep telling him ‘Boy don’t go outside, he will beat you again.’”
Eventually the father did go outside as Flora said Sham’s antics became too much to bear.
“Sham started playing the radio real loud and he (his father) went outside and take it off, when he came back to bed, Sham put back on the radio more loud.”
The man went outside a second time, bringing the radio into his bedroom.
“He bring it and put it on a chair and that is when Sham come in the room and start beating him. He was kicking him and using his foot to squeeze his neck and stop his breathing. I was begging him not to do it, I thought (he) was going to die.”
She was able to calm her son enough to get him away from his father and take him into the kitchen.
“I was asking him why he getting on and he tell me we lock him out the house. But I carry him in the kitchen and show him the door was open and he say ‘Mammy ah sorry.’”
Tragic end
At that point, unknown to Flora, the man had taken up a knife and come into the kitchen.
“He make one lil’ swipe across Sham throat, but it just scrape him and then I push him away. But Sham kick the man and he fall down, when he get back up, he just rush him and stab him.”
Flora said when Sham fell, she was able to put him onto a table in the kitchen, while the other man ran off in shock.
“Sham was saying, ‘Mammy, he stab me’ and I make him lie down on the table, I was using one hand to block the wound and the other to pump his chest and help him breathe.”
Flora said the older man panicked and took off the breakers in the panel box, leaving her and her dying son in the dark.
“I try to put it on back but I didn’t know what to do and the whole place was dark. I couldn’t see to do anything so I run by Sham cousin to get somebody to put back on the lights for me.
“When we come back, he was already gasping for breath and all he say was ‘Water’, I give him some to drink and then he hand just drop from mine…and that was it. It didn’t even take five minutes for him to die.”
But Flora said although she loved her son, he kept his parents “living in hell” for years.
“I fed up make report at the Penal Police, every time they just come and talk to him and leave, they never lock him up or anything. Sham used to beat us all the time, when he was sober he was a real nice person, but anytime he drink it was like living in hell.”
“He was always threatening to kill us and beating me and the man up.”
She said that now she is alone, she does not know how she will cope without the men in her life.
“One dead and the other one lock up…I don’t know how to cope with this, I really don’t know what I will do.”
The older man was taken to the Siparia Health Facility on Sunday night after being held by officers of the Penal Police Station, and was treated and discharged.
He remains in police custody.
Officers at the Penal Police Station confirmed that he had made several reports about Sham Siewnarine in the past. The officers further confirmed to the Guardian that the father of the dead man is the only suspect in the case.
