Canadian national Nzunaki Tuitt said yesterday that the unsavoury incident she experienced in Yuma had marred their entire Carnival.
“Today (yesterday) we just put the costume on because it is pretty and went to the avenue, bought something to eat and came back home,” Tuitt, who said this Carnival was her third consecutive time playing with the band, explained.
“This is surreal. And ten minutes before the incident I saw a man bleeding being led away by the guards thinking he was a hooligan, not knowing we would have been next. He (Alexander) could have died and they had no grounds to hit us.”
Speaking at the Socadrome, Hasely Crawford Stadium, yesterday, Yuma public relations officer Acacia De Verteuil said the band had admonished staff to exercise some more restraint in the wake of the incident. She added that such incidents had never occurred before and they “are all shocked” by what happened.
Yuma also issued a statement saying they were aware of the incident, had removed those responsible and were in talks with patrons as well as another affected person, adding they would give this their full attention.
“That aspect of our security and its extraction protocols are being reviewed. The members involved have been replaced. We are committed to serving our masqueraders and thank them for being with us,” the statement added.
Monday’s incident was reminiscent of one last year, where another group of security officers beat a man who entered their band. The guards beat and stabbed 21-year-old Kyshon Bell, of Queen Street, Port-of-Spain, last Carnival Tuesday, after he was accused of throwing a bottle into the band. The incident occurred on Ariapita Avenue, Woodbrook, shortly after 6.30 pm, police said, and he died two hours later at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital.
No one has ever been charged in that incident.
Commenting on the video yesterday, attorney and United National Congress Senator Wayne Sturge said the act of bands throwing people out while masqueraders chipped along public streets was without any legal backing.
Sturge said the bands operated under a landlord/tenant type relationship for certain areas, like the Nelson Mandela Park, where bands rented part of the facility for lunch and other activities. As such, he said bands could not exclude people from the public streets.
“You can’t even exclude a non-band member from the band. What you can do is make sure that they don’t get something to eat or drink. If the man is chipping down the road, outside the judging point, you can’t exclude him. It is a public road, it belongs to all citizens. Until they pass a law saying that they (bands) have exclusive rights to the cordoned off parts of the road then they don’t have such rights. They have been acting illegally,” Sturge said.
Sturge added that apart from civil proceedings, there could be a case of criminal liability against the band if it was proven that the guards acted on instructions to use such force to expel unwanted masqueraders from the band.
He added that force beyond common assault was an offence and depending on the injuries sustained the punishment could increase as the offence would vary.