RESIDENTS of Harpe Place, who were looking on as police processed the murder scene of murdered Port of Spain City Corporation driver Delano Pierre, were silenced on Tuesday afternoon when his daughter came and began screaming out for him.
Pierre, police said, was killed at about 2 pm as he was driving out of the corporation’s Divisional Headquarters located at the corner of Quarry and Observatory Streets, Port of Spain. The 46-year-old of Jubilee Street, Gonzales, died after two men shot him at least seven times. The killers then ran away.
Police said Pierre was killed merely for living in an area where some men were at war with men from another area. Opposite where he was killed is Harpe Place. On Monday night two men were shot there, resulting in one death.
Police said both Harpe Place and Gonzales are mainly the Rasta City Gang's territory. There are pockets of Gonzales that are controlled by the Six Gang. Those two gangs are at war.
Pierre was not a member of either, nor was he a member of any other gang.
As police processed the crime scene, taking photographs and interviewing family members who arrived, residents of Harpe Place peeped through their windows, murmuring.
The chatter, audible, but not loud, died when the child screamed her first “Daddy!”
Those who in between their chats made inside jokes, became quiet. Young men who were previously observed talking, stopped. A few women were seen with their eyes filled with tears. One could not hold it any longer and cried, as Pierre's daughter screamed repeatedly for her father.
The woman who began crying was overheard saying she could not control her emotions.
“I can’t take this nah! I feeling sorry for she. She give me a headache one time.”
Pierre’s daughter arrived at about 3.35 pm and did not stop crying until the family left the scene. She stopped screaming for a while and started again around 4 pm, when undertakers began removing Pierre’s body from the Hyundai truck in which he was killed.
As she screamed, she was joined by another relative who shouted out for Jesus to have mercy on the killers.
[caption id="attachment_971244" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Police crime-scene investigators on the corner of Observatory and Quarry Streets, Port of Spain where Delano Pierre was shot and killed while driving a Port of Spain Corporation vehicle on Monday. - AYANNA KINSALE[/caption]
“What he do to deserve this? Because he from Gonzales? This is overbearing! Have mercy Jesus! This is a senseless killing. He came to work to make a dollar” she shouted.
As she shouted, three police officers who were huddled together were overheard asking each other “When will it end?”
The woman, who identified herself as Pierre’s cousin continued shouting saying had Pierre been her child she would have responded differently. The officers on hearing this said among themselves that such comments were the norm at murder scenes.
After Pierre’s body was removed and hi