Baton-sodomy: Harding says was ashamed to tell doctors; prison wardens mocked him

Last Updated on Saturday, 26 December 2015, 21:00 by GxMedia

23-year old Colwyn Harding Friday afternoon said he made several failed attempts to quietly tell authorities and nurses that a policeman had sodomized with a baton but he was ashamed to do so.

He rejected claims by doctors at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) that he was suffering from strangulated hernia, causing him to undergo emergency surgeries in December.

Speaking from his hospital bed, a bandaged and sutured Harding recalled making efforts to tell the Magistrate, prison wardens and nurses at the GPHC quitely but he was embarrassed.

“When I told the officers in jail the first time, they started laughing me. Why I ain’t tell anybody else because I  felt shame so I never even told anybody,  I didn’t even tell the doctor, Only my mother I told” he said.

Police had arrested him and his girlfriend from a house in Timehri North during a probe about stolen articles.

Days after the court ordered that he be released on his own recognisance, Harding was unshackled at 2:38 Friday afternoon on arrival of a senior prison officer at the GPHC.  Moments before he was released a policeman from the Office of Professional Responsibility was seen taking a very lengthy statement as part of a probe.

Following the incident that allegedly occured between November 15 and 19, the Constable who allegedly committed the act on Harding has been placed under close arrest and eight others including a senior officer have been transferred from the Timehri Police Station to other stations in Georgetown to minimize chances of reduced public trust by the Timehri community and heighten supervision of those police ranks. Commisisoner of Police, Leroy Brumell has said that the policemen have denied sexually assaulting the man.

While Harding maintained that he never had hernia, he remembered that his intestines descending to his scrotum while was on remand at the Georgetown Prison. He said the Medex there had been only giving him painkillers and telling him to return upstairs. “It start getting bigger and bigger and it start paining bad. A nurse try pushing it up and I start to vomit and it wasn’t going up,” he said.

It was not until he began vomiting a green substance and blood that, according to him, he was placed in the infirmary and later rushed to the Georgetown Hospital where he underwent emergency surgery.

GPHC doctors said Harding was first diagnosed with a hernia on December 13, 2013 and referred to a clinic. He was taken back to the Accident and Emergency Unit of GPHC at 10:35 PM on December 17 complaining of severe pains, an increased swelling to the area and vomiting. It was then that he was diagnosed with strangulated inguinal scrotal hernia. Emergency surgery was performed the following day. He underwent a second surgery on December 27.

The doctors earlier Thursday said the man never told them that he was sodomized with a baton and so no internal examination was done.