Trinidad: Man brutally chopped, beaten in viral vigilante attack, police launch probe

Trinidad and Tobago: A disturbing incident of mob justice in Bon Air Gardens, Arouca street attack has left one man brutally injured with face partly chopped after a group of self-proclaimed vigilantes publicly assault and injure the individual with claims that he wanted to steal. 

The assault incident recorded in a now viral video reportedly took place on Wednesday 30th July around the late afternoon when the unidentified man was caught by a group of residents in Bon Air Gardens, Arouca claiming he had entered the neighbourhood to steal. 

The group of self claimed vigilantes in Trinidad detained the individual and subjected him to horrific assaults in public, while filming the whole incident. 

The video showcases the individual surrounded by the hostile group of male residents with the victim pleading with the group saying that he was innocent and was only in the area to meet a woman and fix her phone. 

The group of residents dismissed his claims and proceeded to cut his face twice with a cutlass causing blood to spray all on him due to the deep wound. 

The graphic video continued to showcase the group proceeding to humiliate him by stripping him down and beating him with a stick across his buttocks. 

In a chilling moment the video displays the victim surrounded by the hostile group with tears in his eyes, and blood pouring from his partly chopped face while looking dazed and terrified and one of the men in the group is also seen holding the cutlass and threatening to chop the victim’s other side of the face and kill him. 

Commissioner Condemns the violence 

Commissioner of Police Service Trinidad and Tobago, Allister Guevarro, has strongly condemned the brutal mob attack that unfolded in Bon Air Gardens, Arouca, and was captured in a now viral video.  

Calling the attack deeply disturbing as there is no justice in mob based violence as they have no place in a lawful society, the Commissioner said that such acts of vigilante as well as mob rule does not hold any place in a lawful society. He further added that the TTPS does not and will not tolerate such acts. 

The TTPS police have launched an investigation into the attack and assault that left the man in Bon Air Gardens, Arouca face partly chopped off and beaten. 

The senior police officer has confirmed that they are considering placing serious charges on the man that used the cutlass, to partly cut the victim’s face off and threatened to kill him as he was also well known by the police as a suspect in a shooting incident that occurred in the Bon Air community. 

The victim who sustained multiple deep cut wounds on his face from the cutlass and a broken arm was eventually taken for medical treatment where he received multiple stitches from the chop injuries.