Bandits rob, terrorise 2 separate families

In less than three days, bandits have brutalised members of two separate families, robbing them and carting of millions in cash and jewellery, leaving their victims distressed and in pain, and vowing to pack up and leave.

The first family which was robbed and terrorised is the Vanpat’s, of Liliendaal, East Coast Demerara (ECD), who bandits assaulted last Thursday evening. In fact, wife and mother, Carol Vanpat, was home with her 14-year-old son when the three masked men struck.

Speaking to Guyana Times on Tuesday, Vanpat said it was only 10 minutes after her husband left around 21:00h on Thursday that two armed and masked men mounted her veranda using a construction ladder. The third bandit entered through the door which was opened for him by one of his accomplices.

Vanpat said her sister had just two days before arrived from Canada with her two young children and had decided to visit a friend in Enmore, ECD. She left sometime around 15:00h that day and it was around 21:00h that her husband left to collect his sister-in-law from the Enmore residence.

“I think we were being trailed,” she said. “Maybe they were trailing us since the day she came,” the frustrated woman said. She explained that upon entering the home, the men gun butted her, causing a huge laceration to her head from which blood oozed.

“The whole house was sheer blood; my son’s jersey was sheer blood and my pants”, she said, as she relived the dreaded experience. The woman recalled that after being hit with the gun, she fainted as she “was losing a lot of blood.”

She said she was then held and the bandits turned to her 14-year-old son, who they ordered to go find the money, lest his mother’s throat be slit. She said the child immediately went in search of the money and came out with an undisclosed sum of cash she had withdrawn from the bank to carry out repairs to her house. Her son was also severely beaten by the bandits.

They bandits also reportedly took CDN$5000 which belonged to her sister, she and her son’s cellphones, cameras and some artificial gold jewellery worn by her niece. The bandits then made good their escape on foot.

Vanpat said the Police were contacted and they immediately went in search of the men, as her son was able to track their location using his computer since the men had his cellphone in their possession.

The frustrated woman, in tears, said she could not stand to live in Guyana any longer with her life and that of her family threatened. She said she and her family will have to leave in order to feel safe.

Meanwhile, another family was on Monday evening robbed and the ordeal was very much similar to that endured by the Vanpat family.

Fifty-two-year-old Bhim Singh, of 17 Block R Sophia, Greater Georgetown, said he and his family had just returned from a wake on Monday evening when they were greeted by three masked men who seemed to have been waiting in the yard.

“As soon as I get out my car, I was confronted by the men”. He said he was gun butted across his forehead, leaving a nasty laceration. Before carting off with $48,000 in local currency and CDN$1180 and $300,000 worth in gold, the men reportedly went into the house and “beat up” Singh’s wife and daughter. The bandits then escaped on foot.

Singh said he then summoned the Police who arrived on the scene “less than five minutes after” the call was made.

This is not the first time the family has endured such a tragedy. In July 2013, the businessman said his family was robbed in a similar fashion. He too is tired of the situation and is again calling on the authorities to hasten the issuance of his firearm licences. The Police up to press time were still continuing their respective investigations into the two robberies.