| By Leon SuseranFive police officers swooped down on the Bath Settlement home of a 20-year-old man around 14:30 hrs on Sunday and placed him under arrest for the murder and rape of 14-year-old Basmattie ‘Manda’ Moonsammy of Woodley Park Village, West Berbice.Up to press time yesterday, the suspect was still in custody at the Fort Wellington Police Station assisting with investigations into the girl’s gruesome murder. Moonsammy had been missing from her home over a week ago and it was rice farmers in the area who made the discovery of her smelling, exposed corpse buried in mud in a shallow grave in the backdam area on Saturday morning.Continuous rain had made the body become visible from its burial in the shallow grave.The girl’s body was buried face down in the grave and was discovered with a black brassiere and a skirt. Her underwear was pulled down to her knees. Her neck was also tied with a long piece of shirt fabric.Basmattie ‘Manda’ MoonsammyAccording to reports, the teen was reported missing two Sundays ago,Cheap NFL Jerseys, however,Cheap NFL Jerseys, seeing that it was a regular occurrence (constantly getting away from home), nobody thought it strange. Reports further indicate that the girl had a boyfriend (the suspect) who was previously held for a murder and rape which occurred three years ago in the area. He was later acquitted of all charges for lack of evidence and witnesses.TENSE SCENEThe scene was tense when Kaieteur News returned to West Berbice yesterday. The autopsy on Moonsammy’s body was performed early in the morning in New Amsterdam and a funeral service was held just before midday. The emotional farewell saw scores of persons attending to pay their last respects to the Woodley Park schoolgirl. Her badly decomposed remains were later interred at the Bath Cemetery.Her mother was not composed enough to speak and had to be put to rest by family and friends. Her brother Dyal said that Moonsammy and the suspect shared a relationship and regularly walked around in the village.The family was not pleased that the police at Fort Wellington had held the dead girl’s brother for nearly a day at the station in connection with the incident. “Why didn’t they go and find the real rapists and murderers?” vented one frustrated family member.The suspect’s parents, meanwhile, vouched deeply for his innocence and even filed a report at the Complaint’s Desk in New Amsterdam’s Central Police Station for what they said was a beating their son received on Sunday from an officer (name given), whom they claimed was intoxicated, shortly before the suspect was arrested.The man’s mother noted that the cops stormed the house and asked for her son. “He did get on his boxers because he did just done work and come home,” she related.The police asked him to put on his clothes. The woman alleged that one of the officers then hit him and ransacked the entire bedroom located in the lower flat of the building.“The officer then kicked him in his private and hit him on his back,” she claimed.The suspect was then accosted to the station where he was placed in the lock-ups.The parents denied that the suspect and Moonsammy shared a relationship.“She don’t live this side,Cheap Jerseys Wholesale, she lives at Number 11 (Woodley Park). They never had a relationship– nothing, nothing, nothing– that girl is not a sensible girl– she walks all over the place,Cheap NFL Jerseys,” said the mother. “She got away from the orphanage when they sent her to school…why they didn’t put all that in the newspapers?”“A murder story happened four years ago and that story done— and just so how they came and arrested my son, just so they come and arrested him on Sunday”, the father said. “So anything happening now, they coming and hold him…this girl is a walkabout girl, why don’t they investigate where she stays– she goes to different people place and if you hear what time she does go out and come in,” the man claimed.ALIBIThe suspect’s parents vouched for their son by saying that they can account for his whereabouts last week.“My son was home…he works with his father, fishing in Rosignol and planting garden, and my house was full and me son was here doing the work with me. We are Christians, we are telling the truth,Wholesale Jerseys From China, we don’t speak lies. He punish three years… innocent, and now they want to punish him again. It’s advantage. I am not going to take this again!” the woman exclaimed as she broke down in tears.“If I had money yesterday (Sunday), I would have taken a lawyer. That lawyer knows her whereabouts…even he said that the girl walks 12, 1, 2 in the morning,Cheap Jerseys Store, going home, all over the place, with drugs people,” she stated.“My son is innocent! He was home at that time!” she said.Police are continuing to grill the suspect, while post mortem results have not been released as yet. |
