Minibus conductor charged for hit-and-run fatal accident

Unlicensed and driving an uninsured motor vehicle

…on Christmas Eve at Bagotstown

By Paula Gomes

Even as family members of the late 38-year-old Shahabb ‘Vincent’ Scippeo, a mason who was killed in an early Christmas Eve Day accident, mourn his tragic death, the driver of the motor vehicle involved in the accident has been arraigned before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan at the Georgetown Magistrates Courts on Thursday, charged with causing death by dangerous driving, along with several other traffic offences.

Accompanied by his lawyer, Trenton Lake, the accused, Damian Walcott, pleaded not guilty to the offence of causing death by dangerous driving, which detailed that on December 24, 2017, on the Bagotstown Public Road, East Bank Demerara (EBD), he drove minibus BLL 3140 in a manner dangerous to the public, thereby causing the death of Scippeo.
Lake told the court that his client is a thirty-year-old route 32 (Parika-Georgetown) minibus conductor of Block A, Tuschen New Scheme, East Bank Essequibo (EBE).
Bail was granted in the sum of $500,000 for the particular offence, and Walcott was ordered to report to the Providence Police Station on a weekly basis, pending the outcome of trial. A request for bail reduction was rejected, and this matter was adjourned to January 15, 2017.
Walcott, who does not have a driver’s licence has been barred from obtaining or owning such a document during the course of the trial.
Walcott has also been slapped with four traffic offences, for which he was arraigned before city Magistrate Dylan Bess earlier on Thursday. He accepted responsibility for being in control of a motor vehicle without being the holder of a minibus driver’s licence that was in force at the time; failing to render assistance post-accident; failing to report the accident; and driving an uninsured motor vehicle.
Walcott was fined a total of $80,000 for those offences.
According to Police Prosecutor Arvin Moore, the defendant was proceeding south along the western side of the Bagotstown Public Road when he struck down a pedestrian who was in the process of crossing the road from west to east.
This publication was told that Scippeo was flung onto the road as a result of the impact, and was dragged for several feet before the vehicle came to a stop.
The driver of the minibus was reported to have fled the scene following the accident, and the unconscious body of the now deceased was picked up some time after and taken to the Diamond Diagnostic Centre, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
Scippeo, a former resident of the Peter’s Hall community (EBD), is the eldest of four siblings, and leaves to mourn many devastated relatives and friends. He had just celebrated his 38th birthday, and unfortunately never got home to indulge in the delicacies prepared by his mother and awaiting his return.