RHON­DOR DOWLAT

Ro­man Catholic priest Fr Mau­rice White, who was bad­ly beat­en dur­ing a vi­o­lent rob­bery in Ve­ga de Oropouche, San­gre Grande, over the week­end, has been dis­charged from the hos­pi­tal and is re­cov­er­ing.

A state­ment from the Arch­dio­cese of Port-of-Spain said, “The Arch­dio­cese of Port-of-Spain thanks every­one for their prayers and sup­port fol­low­ing the re­cent in­ci­dent in­volv­ing Fr White, who was a vic­tim of a rob­bery. He has been dis­charged from the hos­pi­tal and is re­cov­er­ing well.”

Around 7.30 am on Sat­ur­day, of­fi­cers from the San­gre Grande CID re­spond­ed to re­ports of a man with a head in­jury at Sa­hadeen Trace, Ve­ga de Oropouche. When they ar­rived, they found White bleed­ing and bare­ly con­scious. He told of­fi­cers that around 7 am, while so­cial­is­ing, he was at­tacked by three men who beat him se­vere­ly, in­flict­ing a head in­jury, and then stole his ve­hi­cle.

Emer­gency Re­sponse of­fi­cers took White to the San­gre Grande Hos­pi­tal where he re­mained un­der med­ical su­per­vi­sion.

Three men were ar­rest­ed on Sat­ur­day morn­ing in con­nec­tion with the at­tack on the priest, who serves at St Fran­cis RC Church in San­gre Grande.

Po­lice in­ter­cept­ed White’s stolen Toy­ota Aqua around 9 am along the south­bound lane of the Sir Solomon Ho­choy High­way in Freeport. The sus­pects, aged 20, 24, and 31, are all res­i­dents of Ve­ga de Oropouche and re­main in po­lice cus­tody as­sist­ing with in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

The ar­rests fol­lowed a co­or­di­nat­ed ef­fort in­volv­ing the Air Sup­port Tac­ti­cal Unit, led by ASP Dirk Barnes, and the High­way Pa­trol Unit. White’s ve­hi­cle has been sent for foren­sic analy­sis.