11-year-old Adriana Younge died by drowning- family’s lawyer

Last Updated on Saturday, 3 May 2025, 12:35 by Writer

Adriana Younge, the 11-year-old girl, whose body was found in a pool at Double Day Hotel, Tuschen, East Bank Essequibo, last week Thursday, died by drowning, according to her family’s lawyer Darren Wade.

“Based on the findings, they determined that she died by drowning,” he told a virtual news briefing.

That was also briefly conveyed to the media by the girl’s father, Subrian Younge, but he indicated that it was unacceptable. “Once they talk about drowned, no results,” he said.

Concerning the dark marks on face and limbs Younge’s body, the lawyer said the forensic pathologists explained that it was a result of damage caused by the water.

He said the pathologists did not find any broken bones, and they did not determine any inflicted injuries to the body.

He said the body had started to decompose.

Mr Wade said there was no determination about where she drowned. Asked about reports of cotton wool in Younge’s nostrils, he said the forensic pathologists “did not observe cotton wool at that stage” during the examination.

Now that the autopsy has found that Younge died by drowning, Attorney-at-Law Wade said ” the family continues to press the State for an independent and impartial investigation.”

The lawyer hoped that the Guyana government would accede to the family’s request for the United States Federal Bureau of Investigations or the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to conduct a probe.

“I believe it is critical at this point in time for the family and the entire country that the State acts; that the President doesn’t just talk but he delivers based on that promise to the family,” he said.

The several hours’ long autopsy was conducted by three forensic pathologists. Two of them – Dr Glenn A. Rudner, a forensic and anatomic pathologist affiliated with Mount Sinai Hospital and the Icahn School of Medicine in New York City and Dr Shubhakar Karra Paul, an International Forensic Pathologist based at the Forensic Sciences Centre under the Office of the Attorney General in Barbados – and the family’s representative Trinidad and Tobago-born Chief Medical Examiner of the US State of Delaware, Dr Gary L. Collins.

“They worked in tandem…From untrained eye, they did a thorough examination,” Mr Wade added.

Family doctor, Caleb McCloggan also witnessed the autopsy that began at 1:15 p.m. and ended at about 5 p.m.

President Irfaan Ali was expected to hold a news conference later Monday night.

Meanwhile, detachments from the Guyana’s Police Force’s Tactical Services Unit were busy for most of Monday afternoon into the night dispersing sympathetic supporters and protesters who flocked parts of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC).

Police fired pellets at groups of persons around the GPHC, several of whom retaliated by hurling bottles and bricks at the law men.

One woman was among three persons injured.

The police lost at least one shield to a protester who used it effectively to protect himself as he pelted the law men while retreating from a hail of gunfire.

Protesters also set fire to a small pile of objects on Middle and Thomas streets about one hour after they failed to set alight a larger stack of wood near the old Prashad’s Hospital.

Several volleys of shots were fired.

Inside the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation compound near the mortuary there were scores of persons who managed to enter to support the grieving family and relatives of Adriana.

Eventually, the pathologists, Mr Wade and other persons exited through another door of the GPHC conference room and were whisked away in a bus.

On Regent Street, the commercial heart of Georgetown, persons had blocked a section of that thoroughfare with wooden pallets. Police were seen removing the blockages.

As the police engaged the protesters, President Irfaan Ali vowed that his administration would not tolerate a descent into disorder.

“We support peaceful protests and expressions from every law-abiding citizen but would not condone illegality. Let us pursue the truth within the confines of the law,” he said.