Six teens confess to taxi driver's murder

•  were after “money and a shine ride”

By Michael Jordan

Six youths, aged between 15 and 17, have reportedly confessed to murdering 35-year-old taxi driver Teddy Smith.

They have reportedly given detectives a chilling account of how they committed the crime.

Police sources confirmed last night that six youths, including a 16-year-old who was caught red-handed Monday night driving the car which the slain man had been driving, have been detained. The others were arrested yesterday.

Sources say that three prospecting knives, believed to be the murder weapons, were retrieved from the suspects. Police last night appeared confident that the suspects will be charged within a few days.

Kaieteur News understands that five of the teens are from Cummings Lodge Squatting Area, while the sixth is from Prashad Nagar.

The youths have also been implicated in the attempted hijacking of taxi driver Deochand Debidayar at Ogle on Monday night.

Detectives said that one of the youths, said to be the mastermind, was found hiding in a wardrobe at his parents' Cummings Lodge home.

From all reports, none of the boys is from an impoverished background. This has led detectives to believe that the murder and theft were committed for ‘fun.'

It is alleged that on Sunday night, the youths hatched a plan to go into Georgetown and hijack a car.

According to reports, the youths were looking for “a shine ride.”

Three of the youngsters subsequently headed for Georgetown.

Taxi driver Teddy Smith, who was near the Demico House Car Park in a burgundy Toyota Carina, reportedly spotted the youths and asked them if they wanted to hire him.

Kaieteur News understands that Smith and his passengers headed up the East Coast of Demerara.

The teens asked him to stop at U.G Road, where they picked up the rest of the gang.

They then told the taxi driver that they wanted to go to the Underground Bar at Lusignan.

However, when Smith reached Beterverwagting, the youths attempted to stick him up. “They said that he fought and they stabbed him up,” a source told Kaieteur News.

This newspaper understands that Teddy Smith put up a desperate struggle, scratching one of his attackers on the neck.

However, the teens overpowered him, stabbing him at least nine times.

Some residents recalled hearing Smith scream for help and shouting ‘murder', ‘thief', as he staggered down the road leading from the Railway Embankment, before he collapsed.

The teens told detectives that they then drove away with Smith's car.

The suspects reportedly told police that on Monday, they attempted to hijack a second car. This time, the victim was Debichand Debidayar, who is employed with an Industry, East Coast Demerara taxi service.

Debidayar was on the East Coast in a Toyota, HA 7772, when the youths hired him.

When they arrived at Ogle, the youths, who were armed with knives and cutlasses, began to beat him.

Fortunately, ranks from Special Constabulary mobile patrol heard the driver's screams and came to his aid.

Five of the youths fled as the ranks approached, but a sixth was nabbed inside the car that the youths had stolen the previous day from Teddy Smith.

Kaieteur News understands that it is this suspect who first confessed and led police to the rest of the gang.

None of the suspects has a prior criminal record.

However, detectives say the alleged mastermind was a prime suspect in a gas station robbery, which occurred at Ogle about a year ago.

Detectives have reportedly lifted fingerprints from the slain driver's car, and are preparing to compare them with the suspects' fingerprints.