(Trinidad Newsday) An abusive relationship ended in murder on the weekend as Guyanese-born grandmother Enid Rosaline Periana, 62, was chopped to death inside the man’s apartment in Madras Road, St Helena.
Police believe Periana was hacked to death Friday night although the gruesome discovery of her body was made the following day in the apartment building at Boyie Trace off Madras Road. The suspect, who residents said is over 65 and sells clothes in Tobago, has gone into hiding.
Tenants recalled yesterday that Periana moved into the apartment about three months ago with the suspect. She kept to herself but almost daily, they would hear screams from inside the apartment leading them to strongly suspect she was being physically abused. The tenants, who all did not want to be identified, told police that on Friday at 10 pm, they heard screams from inside the apartment with Periana bawling out for her mother. A short while later the screams stopped and there was silence.
Minutes later, tenants saw the suspect walk out to the road with two plastic bags in his hands.
He boarded a car. Tenants said they assumed it was yet another beating and made nothing of it. The following day around midday, the driver of the car went to the apartment and told tenants he had some bad news to deliver. “The driver told us that (suspect’s name called) sent him to tell us that we must go and check on the woman. He (the suspect) said if she did not answer, we should break in to see. At this stage we called the police and when they came, they forced their way into the apartment and found the woman’s body on the ground in a bedroom. Blood was all over and body parts were hanging from the skin,” said a tenant.
Periana, police sources said, was chopped all over her body and police recovered a bloodstained cutlass. Newsday was told that the Guyanese woman had previous addresses at Sandalwood Crescent in Malabar and at Broadway Road in Arima. Her daughter and granddaughter live at Frederick Settlement in Caroni.
Newsday was also told that the suspect was renting the apartment since August and gave the landlord his (the suspect) address as being Mc Bean, Calcutta No 3 in Couva.
“Almost every day she got licks. She was not allowed to even tell us ‘good morning’ or ‘good evening’. One time the woman burnt the pork while cooking and that man beat her bad, bad. Another day, she was carrying some bags in both hands and he pushed her for walking too slow,” said one of the tenants.
Since the gruesome discovery, neither tenants nor other residents have seen the suspect. An autopsy is expected to be performed today at the Forensic Science Centre in St James. No arrest has been made.
