Dissatisfied that all they got was an old cellphone and $1,000, three armed bandits who stormed the St Martin de Porres Church early yesterday threatened to kidnap renowned Roman Catholic priest Fr Clyde Harvey for a $50,000 ransom.
Speaking to the media at the church later on, a parishioner, who did not want to be named, recalled that Harvey relayed to her his fears after the men accosted him.
“The fellas was waiting for him under the step for when he come out to pray. He tell me they ask him if the Archbishop will pay $50,000 for him. I ask him, I say ‘Father where they would put a big man like you?’ He say ‘I was wondering because I can’t fit in no trunk.’ He said he said his prayers because he was a bit scared,” she said.
According to a media release issued by the Archdiocese, Harvey was robbed of $1,000 and his cellphone after three bandits broke into the presbytery around 5 am.
Harvey had spent Sunday night at the church’s manse located on the compound at Hermitage Road, Gonzales, in preparation for a seminar at Mt St Benedict’s yesterday.
The thieves, who reportedly got onto the compound by jumping a wall and breaking in through a side door, also tied up Harvey and threatened to kill him. The thieves also ransacked the office area. However, Harvey managed to escape and run to a nearby home where he called the police and Archbishop Joseph Harris.
Neighbours were disgusted that such a thing happened but thanked God that Harvey, who has been outspoken against injustice and has worked to bring down crime levels in the community, was unharmed.
Fr Harvey won the Humming Bird Medal Gold in 2011 for his role in community service and religion. He is also the chairman of three non-government organisations—Community Intervention for Transformation and Empowerment, South AIDS Support and the Morris Marshall Development Foundation.
When the T&T Guardian visited the area yesterday, two women sat down speaking about the robbery. The women said the incident was a shock to them, querying who would rob a church and Harvey’s church at that.
“We don’t know what to say, it just shocking to we, the church? What again you will do? I don’t know, and the hour of the morning. It was about 5.40 am you know. Father Harvey! That real shocking, that is why I say thank God he alive,” one woman said.
The other added: “When it comes to the church I don’t want nothing happen again to that church. That is real nonsense, that is what allyuh will do, rob a church?”
A handy man at the church, Valentine “Commando” Pemberton, said he fought with one of the gunmen as they were going through the compound.
“As I pick up the coffee cup, this little a—hole come and with a gun and I move out his way and then he push me so I grab him, but the strength I have I could have killed him in three minutes, but he decided to run,” Pemberton said.
