Romeza Sukdeo, the 22-year-old woman who was killed and dumped in a clump of bushes on Sunday at Parika, East Bank Essequibo (EBE) was reportedly sold for $30,000 to an ex-convict by her alleged boyfriend.
Detectives at the Leonora Police Station have taken over the case and have since arrested two men who were the last persons the woman was seen with before she vanished. One man is an ex-convict and the second is the woman’s boyfriend.
Sukdeo’s boyfriend reportedly sold her for cash to men in the neighbourhood and anyone else who offered to pay.
The Guyana Standard has been informed that just before the woman disappeared, her alleged boyfriend sold her to an ex-convict for $30,000. It is unclear if the woman ever met with the former prisoner or if she was ever paid.
However, a police source said that they believed that something might have transpired between the 22-year-old woman and the two men. Reports are that the deceased was constantly abused by her partner and had her money and personal items stolen.
A Post Mortem examination showed that Sukdeo died of manual strangulation and blunt trauma to the head. Her body was left to rot in a clump of bushes. Investigators had initially assumed that the young woman died from a drug overdose or natural causes.
The victim’s mother, Naimawattie Persaud, claimed that just days before her daughter’s body was found, the 22-year-old confided in her about two persons who threatened to murder her.
The deceased was a drug addict and according to Persaud, her daughter alleged that her boyfriend would usually beat her when she refused to sleep with men in exchange for cash.
The Guyana Standard was told that the young woman was last seen alive by her mother on Diwali night when she visited. “She (deceased) come and sleep two nights by me and she said that these guys after her and if she die then I should go to the police and tell them who kill she,” the mother said.
“My daughter left home since she was 16 and she start smoke the drugs. Since then, I trying every day to get her home back but she not coming home. She does be from one place to the next and sometimes I does see her and then sometimes she does disappear for days,” the distraught woman revealed.
According to Persaud, she visited every agency in the country in a bid to get her daughter help for her addiction but none was offered. “With no help, I tried to get her back but everywhere I go—the ministry, the police—everyone saying that she is 16 years now and she can make her own decision.”
From the age of 16, Sukdeo remained on the streets and had been hooked on illegal drugs.
