Bandits beat, chop and rob Albion family

By Leon Suseran Three masked men armed with cutlasses and a handgun stormed a Lower Corentyne residence.  They chopped, beat and terrorised the five occupants early Wednesday night.

The house that the attack occurred.

The assailants, who were described as “very young men”, pounced on the 34-year-old homeowner Parbattie Bickram, who was at the time accommodating a great aunt and her husband visiting from New York. Sadly, US-based Guyanese, Ramkallie Rampat, 71, and her husband Chetram Rampat, 75, were caught up in the home invasion which occurred at Lot 54, Doctor Bush, Albion. Bickram stated that the men entered shortly after she, her uncle, and daughters Lilawattie Mangroo, 14, and Dhandai Mangroo, 9, had gone upstairs, shortly after 19:30 hrs. Her elderly aunt, however, remained “relaxing on a bed at the bottom-home. Then I hear somebody say, ‘Alyuh hold it right there! Don’t move!’” “When I turn my eyes, one of them already had a cutlass chopping she [Rampat], and they run up to me and start to chop me on my hand—two of them with cutlasses and one of them with a gun with my daughter, and they bend she down by her head and ask for money.” Her younger daughter quickly hid herself in the backyard, while Bickram ordered the older daughter to hand over the cash to the men. “They carried her till to the kitchen with the gun to her head, so she walked up the steps and they were broad-siding me all the while.” The woman’s husband, who was very ill at the time, was also inside with Bickram. One of the bandits was dealing with the elderly woman outside all the while, beating her, while demanding cash. The other two were complaining to each other that “the money tekkin’ long to come.” Bickram said she started to beg for the lives of her children, “and he say let me go quick for it (money) or he will shoot me and the lady (great aunt)….so I hold on to one of their hands and said, ‘Ow babe, come with me, and I will give you all the money I have’.” She then collected an envelope with cash from her daughter who was upstairs and, “I burst the envelope from the step and fling down the money on the step and told them to take it…it was scattered on the steps….but they keep demanding more money and they start to curse.” She said the intruders became angry and stormed up the stairs, “and I run into the bedroom and locked the door and they started to kick the door.” Bickram placed her daughter under a bed in the room. The bandits then attempted to gain access to the room by jumping over the walls from another bedroom. The gunman in the group then started to fire shots in an angle at the roof of the bedroom in which the woman and her daughter were. The woman became terrified, but a flashing light, emanating from a motorcycle travelling on the street, and which beamed on the house, apparently startled the bandits and they fled.

Ramkallie Rampat yesterday displaying her injuries

“When they saw the light, they run downstairs and like they jump out and gone.” Little Dhandai Mangroo then started to scream to her mother upstairs that the bandits had left. Bickram immediately rushed downstairs where she saw the old lady still hiding under the bed, “and I started to holler.” Neighbours started to enter the yard and tended to the teenaged Lilawattie, whose hands were bleeding profusely. She was rushed to the New Amsterdam Hospital where she was treated and sent away yesterday afternoon. Bickram added that ranks from the Albion Police Station arrived on the scene about four minutes after the incident, which lasted some fifteen minutes. The bandits made off with three bangles valued $200,000; $50,000 in cash and a government-issued laptop which Bickram only uplifted earlier on Wednesday. They also took away a bag which contained US$1,200 and “some loose change in foreign currency”.  Bickram and the other persons are of the opinion that if the police had pursued the men with their [the police’s] vehicles, they might have cornered and captured them, “but they wasted time.” Ramkallie Rampat stated that she and her husband arrived in Guyana and were visiting for three weeks. “I see dem three boys circle me—young pickney dem—only the eyes I see….dem seh, ‘We going to kill yuh mother[expletive]…and one give me a chop on my hand and broadside me on my head while the other pull out my bangles.” The woman said she then went under the bed after the bandits moved inside the house to continue their brief reign of terror. “Me only study me passport and wonder if I would get to go back (USA).” Police are investigating. No suspects were held up to press time.