…boyfriend claims she attempted suicide
A 15-year-old girl of Lot 70 Timehri Circuit Area, East Bank Demerara (EBD) continues to battle for her life at the Burns Unit of the Georgetown Public Hospital after her 27-year-old boyfriend allegedly set her on fire.
The suspect has been identified as 27-year-old Shawn Smith, also of Timehri, EBD. He was subsequently charged and remanded to prison.
The teen reportedly told her mother that two Sundays ago at approximately 22:30h, the suspect doused her with kerosene and set her alight at his place of employment. He worked as a security officer at Madewini, Linden-Soesdyke Highway.
However, on the night in question, the young man told the Police that he and the teen were involved in a heated argument during which she poured the kerosene on her body in an attempt to commit suicide. The teen sustained third-degree burns on more than 70 per cent of her body.
In an interview with Guyana Times, the teen’s mother, Joy DeAbreu stated that her daughter “is coming around one day at a time, not fully yet”.
The aggravated mother said that her daughter told the doctors that it was her boyfriend who set her ablaze after he accused her of being unfaithful.
“I never heard that come out she mouth; my daughter is a beautiful girl and is still a beautiful girl and she would never destroy herself,” DeAbreu stated.
According to the mother, her daughter’s relationship with the suspect started in early January and was abusive from the beginning.
“Since in January, this relationship starts and she said since then it is very abusive until this thing happened. But she never confronted me because anytime she tell me or her father, she done know her father would have locked he up,” DeAbreu posited.
She related that her daughter went to use the washroom, but at the same time she received a telephone call from the suspect and left home with her knowing.
“Me and she eat together and I [slept] late that night because I was watching [television] and she said ‘mommy I am out to the wash room and she going wash her hands and she going to come in back and I waiting and within 15 minutes I went outside and I called for her and me ain’t hear no response, but at the time my phone been missing.”
The mother further recalled, “I was trying to see where is my phone, but I couldn’t find it and I say maybe Crystal gone with it and yes she did went with my phone and maybe the person called when she said she going and wash her hands and she went to the workplace,” DeAbreu stated.
After setting the teen on fire, her mother said, the suspect threw several packs of flour on her with the intention of hiding the burns. But it was his co-worker who found the teen and called out for him. She was first taken to her home, but later rushed to the Diamond hospital where she was referred to the Georgetown Public Hospital.
“When he come right, he come with a pack of flour in he hands, he [flour] her skin from top to bottom and she was hollering for him and she was saying hospital ‘Mommy, I got burnt take me to the hospital before I die’,” DeAbreu said.
After realising what had transpired, the victim’s mother, along with the suspect, quickly placed the teen in a taxi and transported her to the city hospital.
Smith was hauled before the courts last week where he was charged and remanded for unlawful and malicious wounding the teen. He is expected to make his next court appearance on Thursday at the Diamond Magistrate’s Court.
