GEORGETOWN, Guyana--Five persons including a three-year-old boy are now dead after the car they were travelling in was sprayed with bullets in a drive-by shooting in Cummings Lodge Saturday night.
Dead are Steve Jupiter, 37, of 12 Industry, ECD, Christopher George, 38, of Sixth and Light Streets, Alberttown, Neil Jupiter, 3, of 288 Independence Boulevard, and a fourth person who was only identified as 'Dice Man.' Fiona Singh, the mother of Neil Jupiter, passed away Sunday morning at the Georgetown Hospital after suffering multiple gunshot wounds.
The shooting occurred at Second Field, Cummings Lodge. According to reports reaching this newspaper, Singh, her son and Jupiter were visiting Singh's cousin in Second Field. As they were leaving the cousin's home in the car they were attacked by unknown persons who fired a barrage of shots at their vehicle.
The shooting was estimated to have occurred some time around 8:00pm. At the scene, police had cordoned off the area and there was a crowd of people trying to get a view of the bodies that had not yet been taken away. Jupiter, who was said to be the driver of the car, was still behind the wheel while the other two men had been placed in an ambulance.
Singh and her child were rushed to the hospital with a police escort. However, the child was pronounced dead on arrival while Singh was taken into surgery, a hospital source said. The three-year-old was said to have been shot four times.
Back at the scene of the attack meanwhile, relatives of Jupiter who were among the crowd could be heard wailing loudly when they recognised his body in the car. One weeping woman, who identified herself as Natasha, said that she was his wife. She had broken through the police cordon and run to the vehicle, and later said that her husband's jewellery was missing.
A resident of the area told this newspaper that shortly before the shooting began he was looking through his window. He had seen a vehicle parked on the University of Guyana back road, and another on the road which runs parallel to it in the New Scheme, a corner before Second Field. "Like they waiting fuh he come out," the witness said. When Jupiter's white Toyota reached the corner of Second Field, the vehicle on the back road crossed the bridge to join the other one, and together they drove up to meet Jupiter's car.
A person or persons then came out of the vehicle and riddled Jupiter's car with bullets. The resident said that he could not ascertain how many persons emerged from the car or if they came out of both cars, since he was not looking out at that point. He estimated that about 50 to 70 shots were fired. Stabroek News
