’THE only peace is rest in peace!’
These were the words uttered by the mother of Travis ’Wet Money’ Breedy yesterday, as his lifeless body lay face-up mere inches away from a drain on George Street, Port of Spain, one day after warring gangs signed a ’peace treaty’.
Breedy, 29, of Duncan Street, Port of Spain, who also went by the name ’Ako’, is believed to have been one of the men who signed the ’treaty’ with rivals among gangs from Nelson, George and Duncan Streets gangs, the day before his death.
According to reports, Breedy and another man Garnett ’Bago’ Lake were walking along George Street, near Eastern Boys’ RC, around 8.10 a.m., when gunmen approached them from the nearby Plannings. Breedy was shot and ran across the road, where he fell and died; while Lake, 28, of Bagatelle Road, Diego Martin, ran a short distance away, collapsing on the corner of Prince and George Streets.
Officers of the Inter Agency Task Force (IATF) and the Repeat Offenders Programme (ROPE) arrived on the scene within minutes and took Lake to the Port of Spain General Hospital, where he died undergoing treatment.
A third man, Curt Raymond, of Mon Repos, Morvant, who was riding his bicycle along George Street, was also shot by the gunmen and was taken to hospital, where he was treated and warded.
Speaking with the media at the scene, Grace Breedy, mother of Travis Breedy, said she spoke to her son on numerous occasions about the company he kept.
’I not lying, I is he mother, I try to talk to him 24/0 and he ain’t listen. When I say, ’Travis don’t do this,’ he would just smile and say, ’Okay, mammy,’’ Breedy said, as she tried to ease her pain with a cold beer. Breedy added that her son liked to follow bad company and it was this company that ’have him lying down dey’.
As tears began filling her eyes, Breedy said all she could do now is bury her only child, as she reminisced that the last time she spoke to her son was the day before he died, only to receive a call telling her of his death yesterday morning.
Breedy, who was a father of three-two sons, Shakeem, eight, Hassani, two, and a one-year-old daughter, Afeisha-was described as ’harden’ by the mother of his first child, Tammy Millar. ’He was a cool, normal one. I don’t know him to be in any badness, I know he harden,’ Millar said.
As Breedy’s bullet-riddled body lay on the ground, residents of the George Street area could not help but condemn National Security Minister Martin Joseph. The residents claimed that the murder toll always increases the minute ’he (Joseph) open he mouth’.
In the budget debate on Tuesday, Joseph ensured that the toll would not pass last year’s record of 550 murders.
Breedy’s and Lake’s killings, and those of three others that took place between Wednesday night and yesterday, elevated the murder toll to 394.
Officers from the IATF, the Special Anti-Crime Unit of Trinidad and Tobago (SAUTT) and the Homicide Bureau visited the scene. Officers attached to SAUTT are leading the investigations.
In an unrelated matter, 41-year-old Garth John was found stabbed to death in his East Grove, Curepe, home in the early-morning hours yesterday.
John, a paralegal employed with Clico, is believed to have known his killer, according to police, as there were no signs of a break-in. He was discovered by the police around 12.30 a.m. yesterday morning, after neighbours saw a strange man driving John’s car out of the area. Nothing else was missing from the home.
Officers attached to Homicide Bureau Region Two, based at the Arouca Police Station, are investigating the matter.
