From Guyana to Antigua, evil is everywhere | Editorial

By Kieron Murdoch | Opinion Contributor

Across the Caribbean and further afield, many eyes are fixed on Guyana today as residents of a community in the East Bank Essequibo called Tuschen continue to express their rage and grief at the disappearance and death of an 11-year-old child named Adrianna Younge. According to Kaieteur News in Guyana, the child went missing on Wednesday afternoon during a family visit to a local hotel, the Double Day International Hotel and Bar, for a swim.

The girl’s absence was quickly noticed, and a search ensued that day. Several news agencies in Guyana report that family members did not find her in the pool when they searched it on Wednesday. It has also been reported that the Tuschen police’s investigation into her disappearance later included evidence that the child was seen entering a vehicle, which headed away from the hotel. Police reportedly followed up on that evidence, but to no avail.

The child’s body was in the pool of the same hotel on Thursday morning, sparking serious questions about the circumstances of her disappearance, death, and the discovery of her body, as the said pool had reportedly already been searched, and since the police subsequently stated that they searched in and around the hotel property during their attempts to find the child.

Needless to say, the events unfolding in Guyana have reminded onlookers in Antigua and Barbuda of the anxious search for 9-year-old Chantel Crump, now deceased, who was allegedly abducted and killed here in Antigua in March. Public sentiment is still raw. It was reported here on Thursday that an initial autopsy was inconclusive, which is to say that a cause of death could not be immediately determined.

There are different reasons why an autopsy might be inconclusive, but the very justifiable public appetite for answers surrounding her death has meant that whenever that desire to know and understand what happened has not been met, it usually leads to accusations of opacity and bad faith on the part of the authorities, which is unhelpful if it does not have reasonable grounds.

Given that this is an important case to the entire nation, it may be advantageous for there to be some collaboration between the media and specialists who can provide some in-depth analysis on the subject of why generally any autopsy may be inconclusive, and what generally transpires thereafter. This would be to aid public understanding of this subject and abate national anxiety.

We must be aware, however, that if anyone is to face justice for the harrowing crime that took Chantel Crump’s life, they must be given a fair trial. Reckless public discussion, especially sensationalised accounts, can prejudice a jury against the defendant, even if the jury has not heard the full details or the evidence presented in court. It often means that we will not know the fullness of what authorities suspect took place until all of it is presented in court.

Looking back over to Guyana, we suspect that there are very many people here who know exactly what the family, friends, and community of the now deceased Adrianna Younge are feeling – grief, confusion, anxiety, fear, and inconsolable rage. These sometimes drive people to take actions they may not otherwise countenance.

Scores of angry community members began a riot (our choice to use this word) at the hotel where the child disappeared and could not be found, only to later turn up dead in a pool, which was reportedly already searched. Videos circulating online show the hotel windows having been smashed, property being looted, and the building set on fire. Other videos show a fire burning at another property, which is said to be connected to the proprietors of the hotel.

Actions have consequences. Many have already noted in the comments under these videos that the destruction or damage to the hotel, if it is assumed to be the scene of a crime, would make it difficult to now gather any forensic evidence as the entire scene will have been seriously disturbed, contaminated or destroyed. Additionally, the fire that was set to the other property that residents believed to be connected to the hotel proprietor threatened to engulf another property as well.

It is difficult to watch people in rage and in mourning over the injustice, evil, or cruelty visited upon their children, and to tell them their desire to lash out in the name of justice or rather, retribution, is unjustified. But we often must. The things people do in the moments when they are at war with themselves in their minds and their hearts, while overcome by emotions that consume them entirely, are often actions they later regret or whose consequences they cannot fully appreciate at the time.

There are no words that can ever suffice to describe the true feelings of grief and the pain that come from losing a child to some act of vileness, violence or cruelty, or to be left without answers to the questions of how, who, and why. The best we can do and the least we can do is to surround those who mourn with comfort and understanding, seek justice and accountability on behalf of the victims, and commit ourselves to doing what is necessary to prevent those who would do evil from harming innocents again. Evil is everywhere, but so too must be justice and change.

See: https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/2025/04/25/body-of-girl-mysteriously-found-floating-20-hours-after-pool-was-searched/

About the writer: 

Kieron Murdoch is an opinion contributor at antigua.news. He worked as a journalist and later as a radio presenter in Antigua and Barbuda for eight years, covering politics and governance especially. If you have an opinion on the issues raised in this editorial and you would like to submit a response by email to be considered for publication, please email [email protected].