The daughter of Retired Assistant Commissioner of Police, George Vyphuis, was in the wee hours of Tuesday morning attacked by an armed bicycle bandit who opened fire, injuring the woman and her colleague.
The traumatised woman, Kathy Vyphuis
Reports are 34-year-old Kathy Vyphuis was making her way home from work at about 02:30h on Tuesday, when a masked bandit pounced on her and her supervisor, Tommy Lee, who was driving her home.
The duo had just arrived at the woman’s Lot 865 Plantation Providence, East Bank Demerara residence and as she was about the exit the vehicle, the lone gunman pounced, demanding that they remain put.
Acting on impulse, Lee accelerated his vehicle, thereby resulting in the robber firing several rounds at them. The injured supervisor managed to flee the scene but Vyphuis did not secure much distance between herself and the attacker when she fell to the ground. It was then that the man narrowed in on the terrified mother, demanding that she let go of her purse.
While speaking to Guyana Times on Tuesday, the traumatised woman broke down in tears while outlining, “I was in fear. He came and I was like take my purse, I don’t have anything, take it. He came with the gun, pick my purse up, jump on a bike and rode off.”
The single mother went on to say that, “I got up and I run and I was like somebody help me, help me! Nobody would help me.”
However, following relentless pleas from the sobbing woman, one neighbour, Nicola Telford, opened her door for the woman.
The two then remained locked inside the home and made numerous attempts to contact the Police. While they were awaiting the arrival of the Police, the bandit returned once again, but this time pretending to be a neighbour. The man then began appealing to the women to open door, saying that he found Vyphuis’s bag on the road.
“He kept banging on the door and saying that he was a neighbour and we asking he which neighbour, identify yourself and he kept saying some neighbour from down the road and we said we don’t know anyone like that.”
After he was denied entry, the bandit continued to bang on the door but eventually gave up and left. It was only after Vyphuis was safety tucked away in Telford’s home that she realised she was covered in mud and blood, after being shot once to her arm. After some time, officers arrived at the scene and Vyphuis was taken to the Diamond Diagnostic Centre.
Meanwhile, her supervisor had already been rushed to the Georgetown Public Hospital, nursing injuries to his hand and thigh. Lee was said to be in unstable condition but was later listed as relatively stable.
The mother of one, who is a cashier at a drinking establishment on the East Coast of Demerara, has been living in Diamond for almost three years.
This report comes two days after bandits broke into a home just doors away, holding a two-month-old infant at gunpoint, in an attempted to rob the family.
Stemming from this most recent incident, residents within the area are calling for immediate measures to be put in place, with some even noting that they are now too terrified to return home.
