Juilet Thomas from the South Leeward village of Chauncey, says, that following the death of her stepdaughter, she has been going through some challenging times.
She told News784 that at around 2.30am on Tuesday 29th May 2018, her daughter came into her room and said; “Mommy, it sounds like thieves outside the house!”
She said her daughter came to the conclusion because she noted a man going around the house and shining a flashlight.
Thomas said, “I get up and went to the door and pull the curtain. When I pull the curtain I saw one man outside with a light”.
Thomas reportedly asked the man what he wanted. “ He said to me I come for the two-man you have inside dey!”
Thomas said, “I asked him, ‘Who two man are you talking about?’ I said, ‘No man living here, only my twin sons live here’ ”.
Thomas then asked the man who he was, to which he replied, “I’m a Police”.
Thomas, now worried, responded,
“I said to him, ‘If you are a Police, show me your I.D – show me a search warrant, because I just can’t open my door to someone I don’t really know is a Police….because you don’t have on any Police clothes! Show me your search warrant or I am not going to open my door”.
Thomas told News784 that she stayed in her house because she was scared that the man, to whom she was speaking, might’ve been impersonating an officer and possibly a thief.
“After I was there not opening my door,” Thomas said, “he began to bang on it, beating it down!”
“I told him, ‘Well you will have to break it down to get in!’, to which he replied, ‘ If I have to break it down, I will break it down’
“He further told me that ‘If I want it the hard way’ that I will get it”. Thomas lamented.
She said she continued to tell the man outside her door, “If you are the police, show me your I.D and show me your search warrant”.
Thomas said during the time she called her husband.
“My husband asked me if the man said he is a Police. I said yes, but I am not sure because he is not wearing a uniform nor did he show me any identification. After that, my granddaughter got up out of the chair and began bawling, so I opened the door”.
Thomas said that on doing so, the man came closer to her door and asked, “Where are the two men you have living here?”
Thomas responded to the still unidentified man by saying, “I am not going to allow anybody to take my children without a search warrant or I.D because up to now you have not stated why you came for my sons, neither have you identified yourself properly”.
Thomas told the man that one of her sons was writing CXC exams the very next morning, to which the man replied,
“ I don’t care”.
Thomas said, “The man said to me, that even if he was down there in the school doing exams, they would have come there and take him out and carry him to the police station”.
Thomas said she told the man after noticing that her porch was now occupied by several uniformed men from the RRU (Rapid Response Unit), that she was going to come with her sons.
“He said to me, ‘If you come, I will lock you up too, and you are not riding in my vehicle’ ”
Thomas told News784 that she kept asking what did her sons do? To which she never received any reply.
The following morning at around 6 am, Thomas said that she went to the Questelles Police station and enquired about her sons. Thomas said she was told there to: ‘Go home and make tea’.
She said the unprofessional manner of some policemen is ‘unbecoming’ and that this was causing more friction with society’s response to helping the Police solve crime.
Thomas told News784 that her sons, Raheed and Jaheed Thomas, were released from police custody on the night of Tuesday 29th May 2018.
On Thursday 31st May, Jeronza Thomas, stepson of Juliet Thomas was among five men who appeared before the court for engaging in an attack on Paul Stephens during a funeral at the Chauncey Cemetery, this according to a police report.
The men will reappear before the Kingstown magistrate court on July 30th, 2018.
