Agricola armoured truck attack…

Headley, 35, of 65 Cross Street , Werk-en-Rust, was shot in the back of the neck during the ambush, which occurred at around 01:00 hr yesterday on the Agricola Public Road, East Bank Demerara.

Headley had been employed at the PGS for five years.

Joseph Bobb, 45, the company's Chief Administrative Officer, was shot in the left shoulder. His condition is listed as stable.

The Meadow Brook Gardens resident has been employed at PGS for 20 years.

Police sources have confirmed that three security guards who were in the back of the vehicle when the attack occurred have since been detained for questioning.

Meanwhile, in the wake of the attack, vanloads of heavily-armed police ranks searched several homes in Agricola, after cordoning off the troubled community for over an hour.

It is unclear whether anyone was arrested.

According to a police statement, the attack on the armoured van was carried out by three armed men who were on the eastern side of the public road.

The release said that the PGS armed escort vehicle was returning to Georgetown to make a night deposit at a city bank, after collecting an undisclosed sum of cash from the Pizza Hut and KFC operations on Vlissengen Road, at Stabroek and at Bagotstown, East Bank Demerara.

As the armoured vehicle, driven by Headley, was passing on the western carriageway along the Agricola Public Road , it came under gunfire from the three armed men, who were on the eastern carriageway.

Donald Headley was shot in the face and right side neck, while Joseph Bobb was shot on the right shoulder.

“During this process, motor car PEE 5657, driven by Ryan Gonsalves of Ogle, East Coast Demerara, with five other occupants, including Dexter Barry, 22, of Liliendaal, East Coast Demerara, and Lottia Primo, was passing through the area and also came under fire.

“Dexter Barry was shot in his head and died on the spot, while Lottia Primo received cuts to her head from glass from the shattered windscreen.

“The security guards in the body of the vehicle later heard a knocking on the door of the vehicle, and upon opening it, saw an armed man outside on the road,” the release said.

They discharged rounds at him while at the same time going to take cover some distance away.

Upon their return to the vehicle, they found that the cash being escorted had been removed from the vehicle,” the release stated.

The guards also saw Headley and Bobb lying on the roadway.

Police say that two mobile police patrols that were north and south of the area responded promptly, upon receiving the report, but the bandits had already escaped.

Police recovered twenty-five 7.62 spent shells, (used in AK-47 assault rifles) a 7.62 round, and a warhead at the scene.

In an interview with Kaieteur News yesterday, PGS Managing Director Dougal Kirkpatrick said that while all the occupants in the armoured van were armed, none of them had donned the bulletproof vests that were issued to them by the company.

“If Headley was wearing his bulletproof jacket he might have been alive,” Kirkpatrick told Kaieteur News.

It is the first time that a PGS armoured van has come under attack.

Police were, yesterday, still trying to ascertain how much cash was stolen.

Rapid Gunfire

Recounting his ordeal from his hospital bed, PGS Administrative Officer Joseph Bobb told Kaieteur News that the PGS ranks had made their last pick-up at the Bagotstown KFC outlet and were heading to Agricola when the gunmen struck.

He said that the attack came without warning, since they had seen nothing suspicious.

“We were approaching Agricola when all I heard was rapid gunfire, and I realised that I had been shot, and I fell on the front seat.” Bobb said that the “rapid gunfire” continued even as he remained slumped on the front seat, so he remained there and pretended to be dead.

The wounded man said that he lost consciousness, eventually recovering at the Woodlands Hospital .

It was only then that he realised that his colleague, Donald Headley, had been mortally wounded.

“I give God all the glory and thanks that I am alive,” the father of seven said.

The PGS official said that, despite the crime wave, he had never been apprehensive about travelling on the East Bank Demerara.

“It is just that last night (yesterday) was an unguarded and unfortunate moment.”

Bobb said that he was late for work and so did not don his bulletproof vest, as was the custom.

“But even the life jackets would not have protected me and Headley.”

He said that the gunmen apparently shot at the wheels of the armoured van first before shooting himself and the driver.

From all reports, the gunmen knew that the armoured van would have been using the East Bank Demerara route.

Kirkpatrick, however, say he is “absolutely sure” that none of his staffers were in collusion with the gunmen.

“I am absolutely sure that it was not a conspiracy,” he said.

He explained that the ranks who escort the cash are rotated, and the order in which the cash is picked up is regularly changed.

But he believes that the gunmen knew the route that the armoured truck was taking, since the route never changes.

“Although we change the timing, we still have to use that one road (the East Bank public road)…and it appears that the gunmen were waiting for them,” Kirkpatrick said.

Kaieteur News understands that a police vehicle regularly patrols in the vicinity of Agricola at night.

A police source said that the gunmen were apparently monitoring the patrol, and struck after the ranks left the area for a few minutes to pursue a motorcycle heading north along the public road.

According to the source, the ranks were in the vicinity of Banks DIH when they heard the gunfire and raced back to the scene.

However, by then, the gunmen were gone.

“If we had gone there a minute earlier we wound have encountered the gunmen,” the source said.

“It would have been a bloodbath.”

The source said that as soon as the armoured van reached Agricola, the gunmen, who had AK-47 rifles and handguns, opened fire, hitting Headley, Bobb and Barry, who was in a passing car.

One of the occupants of the car that Barry was in said that he was in the back seat when he saw four men standing on the road and wearing black bullet-proof vests.

He said that one of the men, who was armed with a high-powered rifle, opened fire on the car, fatally wounding Barry.

“It was not an accident. The men deliberately opened fire on us,” one of the occupants of the car said.

Barry's parents and siblings reside overseas, and Barry himself was scheduled to migrate by year-end.

In an earlier interview, Kirkpatrick said that after the gunfire ceased, the three guards at the rear of the vehicle assumed that the attack was over and made the mistake of opening the van.

It was then that the gunmen were able to snatch the payroll.

Kirkpatrick had explained earlier that about 16 bullets struck the side of the van, but each failed to penetrate the thick armour.

He revealed that PGS has a $2.5M insurance policy on the life of each of its ranks, and that money will be given to Headley's reputed wife.

He also promised that the company will handle all the expenses for the slain driver's funeral.

Sunday 08-19-2007