Tobago’s latest murder linked to hit list

Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

To­ba­go’s mur­der count hit an­oth­er record yes­ter­day morn­ing when a fa­ther of one be­came the is­land’s 24th mur­der vic­tim.

Nicholas Mitchell, 32, who is al­so known as Dad­dy T, is be­lieved to be the lat­est tar­get in a wave of killings tied to a com­mu­ni­ty hit list fol­low­ing the mur­der of Beetham res­i­dent Aman­da Guer­ra. He was one of two men killed hours apart over the week­end.

Mitchell’s moth­er, Ann Marie, said: “Who­ev­er came climb up on the win­dow and shot him on his bed. He got up from the bed and run to this door there.”

She said her son used his fi­nal breath to call out to her, then col­lapsed and died.

Mitchell was shot by un­known gun­men just af­ter 2 am while he slept at his home at Main Road, Ar­gyle.

His moth­er be­lieves he is one of many marked for death in the com­mu­ni­ty fol­low­ing the mur­der of Beetham Gar­dens res­i­dent Aman­da “Dol­ly Boss” Guer­ra at Lam­my Road in Au­gust. She died at the Rox­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal while re­ceiv­ing emer­gency treat­ment.

A week af­ter her mur­der, gun­men at­tacked Mitchell out­side a gro­cery in Ar­gyle. He es­caped by run­ning in­to the sea and swim­ming to an­oth­er vil­lage.

How­ev­er, a doc­tor, wait­ing in her car, was shot in the neck as she shield­ed her ba­by from the hail of bul­lets.

Mitchell’s moth­er ex­plained, “Since an up­surge that they have in the vil­lage in Lam­my Road about this la­dy that died from Trinidad every­thing hel­ter-skel­ter and per­sons’ names start to call and I al­ways hear­ing they have a list.”

She de­scribed her son as “a lit­tle trou­ble­some” but in­sist­ed that he was not heav­i­ly in­volved in crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty. She said she con­stant­ly warned him to stay away from the block.

“I nev­er know him in any il­le­gal ac­tiv­i­ty. He used to sell his lit­tle weed but not in­to any gun things or any­thing,” she said.

The dis­traught woman be­lieves the sit­u­a­tion is out of the po­lice’s con­trol.

“It re­al up­set­ting be­cause a Fri­day night they killed a fel­la in Lam­my Road and Sun­day morn­ing they kill Nicholas,” she said

Bran­don Ed­wards was shot and killed on Fri­day night as he made his way home af­ter lim­ing at a bar. Up to yes­ter­day af­ter­noon, in­ves­ti­ga­tors were still search­ing for a mo­tive for his death.

Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine was un­avail­able for com­ment yes­ter­day.

Re­cent­ly ap­point­ed To­ba­go Di­vi­sion ACP Os­wain Subero, who ar­rived in To­ba­go on Fri­day, could not com­ment when con­tact­ed by Guardian Me­dia. At­tempts to reach him lat­er were al­so un­suc­cess­ful. The is­land’s new Snr Supt Earl Elie has been un­reach­able since his ap­point­ment. Guardian Me­dia has been try­ing for ap­prox­i­mate­ly one week to reach him.