Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Fa­ther of one, An­drew Per­sadie, was de­scribed as a saint dur­ing his fu­ner­al ser­vice at the Es­per­ance Pres­by­ter­ian Church in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day.

Still try­ing to make sense of the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing his ab­duc­tion and mur­der as they bade him a fi­nal farewell, his loved ones prayed that God would give them an­swers soon.

On In­de­pen­dence Day, Au­gust 31, Per­sadie, 42, was kid­napped from his Union Hall, San Fer­nan­do home, beat­en on the head and stran­gled to death. His body was found hours lat­er near the Usine Ste Madeleine Pond.

Per­sadie’s cousin, Ginelle Per­sadie, who, to­geth­er with Christo­pher Per­sadie and Jay Das­sarth, de­liv­ered the eu­lo­gy, lament­ed, “We gath­er here to­day still reel­ing from the trag­ic pass­ing of An­drew. We are shocked, scared, and an­gered at the cir­cum­stances that took him from us. We seek to make sense of this to un­der­stand the rea­son why this hap­pened. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, there are no easy an­swers, and as dif­fi­cult and painful as it is, we must ac­cept that An­drew is no longer with us.”

She said Per­sadie touched the hearts of every­one he met, showed kind­ness, and gave joy to those around him. Ginelle re­called his pas­sion for life, cars, and trav­el­ling.

The of­fi­ci­at­ing min­is­ter, Rev In­dra Kokaram, re­called that Per­sadie was re­served and unas­sum­ing in church, and she viewed him as a saint.

Lament­ing the hor­rif­ic cir­cum­stances of his death, she said, “The sa­cred­ness of life has been vi­o­lat­ed. How are we to find the words to ex­plain this atro­cious act up­on An­drew? The pain, the bit­ter­ness, and the hurt are heart-rend­ing. One word ris­ing up from our very be­ing, why?”

Not­ing that crim­i­nal el­e­ments have in­fil­trat­ed so­ci­ety with no re­spect for life and prop­er­ty, she said they do not fear God. She urged peo­ple to look out for each oth­er and be their broth­er’s keep­er.

Fol­low­ing the ser­vice, An­drew’s body was tak­en to the J-E Guide Fu­ner­al Home and Cre­ma­to­ri­um in San Fer­nan­do for cre­ma­tion.

In­ves­ti­ga­tors have not yet dis­closed a mo­tive or ar­rest­ed any­one in con­nec­tion with his mur­der.