IN SCENES straight out of a crime drama movie, two suspects who are believed to be responsible for shooting two men along Serraneau Road in Belmont, were flushed out hours later from a drain they were hiding in, opposite the St Francois Girls' College on September 27.
A senior police source said that at about 11 am, Curtis Jones and Pafawa Roberts were shot in Serraneau Road with the two gunmen subsequently running off. The shot men were taken to hospital for treatment.
Officers from the Port of Spain Division Task Force and the Investigation and Operations Unit (IAU) received a tip-off that two men who jumped out of a Nissan Tiida car, ran towards and jumped into a covered drain opposite the college.
Newsday arrived at 2.30 pm to find seven officers – guns drawn – surrounding a manhole at the corner of Waterman Road.
Three more officers emerged from the drain which saw water rushing through thanks to earlier rainfall in the surrounding area. The officers went to Percy Road – one street away – and searched a drain there.
Meanwhile, classes at the college were dismissed at 1.40 pm and the media tried speaking with parents who were picking up their children from school. Reporters flagged down the vehicle of a parent who picked up his daughter.
He said, "I feeling very unsafe."
Asked what he heard happened, he said, "They heard the shots and they (school officials) had to lock the gates and the school was closed up."
[caption id="attachment_1111262" align="alignnone" width="1024"] GOT HIM: Policemen haul a suspect from a manhole near the St Francois Girls College on Friday following a dramatic manhunt through the covered drainage system. The man's face was digitally altered by Newsday to protect his identity since at the time, he was only a suspect, and no charges were laid against him. - Photo by Roger Jacob[/caption]
"I feel traumatised especially after what happened in Malick two days ago where they shot men outside a preschool."
The parent was referring to an incident on Wednesday where two men were shot dead and three others – including a four-year-old boy – were shot and wounded in front of the preschool in Malick.
Another man who came to collect his step-daughter at the college said crime had gotten out-of-hand. His daughter said the school was locked down and students and teachers had locked themselves into classrooms. While Newsday spoke with parents and students, heavily-armed police continued their search of the drain at the corner of Waterman Road for the suspects. Loud shouts from the officers confirmed that the suspects were trapped inside the drain.
CHAOS, GUNSHOTS THEN CAPTURE
A policeman, wearing a dark green jersey and black jeans with tactical boots and no bulletproof vest went into the drain with his pistol drawn. Other officers guarded various manhole covers traversing the drain along St Francois Valley Road in Belmont.
Officers were heard shouting orders for the suspects to surrender and come out of the drain.
At 3.28 pm, a man was seen at the manhole entrance and
