The mother of a child diagnosed with cerebral palsy was found murdered at her home in Gasparillo yesterday.
Ornella Philip, 28, was found sprawled on the living room floor of her home on Thompson Street, with a single gunshot injury to the chest.
Philip lived in a ground floor apartment of the building with her eight-year-old daughter, Kayla, who has cerebral palsy.
Kayla was left with her grandmother, Joanne Seepersad around 11.30 pm on Saturday to spend the night.
Seepersad lived in an apartment to the back of the building and the family has two groups of tenants who also live in the building.
Police reports stated that around 10 am, a man from the area went to purchase a cigarette from one of the tenants and noticed the front door to Philip’s apartment was ajar.
He called out to her and saw her body on the floor in the living room area. The man told his friends who were nearby and they then alerted Seepersad who was upstairs.
When Seepersad entered the apartment, she discovered her daughter’s body.
At the scene yesterday, neighbours reported hearing a loud bang around 1 am on Sunday but said no one investigated the noise.
Philip’s relatives were hesitant to speak to the media and a relative would only say that Philip was a full-time caretaker for her daughter.
Insp Ramkhelawan of the Gasparillo Police said Philip’s murder was the fifth in the district for the year.
He said although the district’s homicide rate is relatively high, other serious crimes have decreased.
PC Noyan is continuing investigations.
Philip’s death brings the number of people who have been murdered for the year so far to 243.
In an unrelated incident, Siparia Police are investigating a possible homicide in the area.
According to reports, Miguel Lalman, 26, was hunting at Location #119, Range Resources, Quinam Road, Siparia, on Saturday when he called his father-in-law around 10 pm and told him he had been shot.
Lalman lived in Mendez Village, Siparia.
The father-in-law and another man went into the forest to search for Lalman and brought him out to a clearing and called the police. However, by the time officers arrived, Lalman had died. He had been shot once in the upper right shoulder.
Siparia police are continuing investigations