A British man visiting the Bahamas was shot dead when masked gunmen burst into his family's home.
Edgar Dart, 56, was killed after he struggled with robbers who broke into his mother's home on Grand Bahama, the Royal Bahamas Police Force said.
Mr Dart, who lived in Winnipeg, Canada, was visiting his mother in the island's Emerald Bay neighbourhood when the attack happened at around 7am local time on Tuesday.
The three robbers tied up family members with duct tape and Mr Dart was shot during the ensuing struggle, assistant commissioner Emrick Seymour said.
The attackers, reportedly armed with a gun and a machete, are said to have stolen jewellery and other personal belongings.
Philip Poole, Mr Dart's brother-in-law, said the gang threatened Mr Dart's teenage son George and five relatives and tied them up as he lay dying on the floor.
He said his own son, Pip, 29, had also been attacked and left with machete wounds.
Mr Poole said: "Edgar was a tough guy and as soon as the men burst into the house he remonstrated with them. One of the raiders then shot him in the chest.
"The gang then tied everyone up, including his mother Joy and George. I have been told they were forced to look on helplessly as Edgar lay on the floor bleeding to death in front of them.
"It took him around an hour to die and there was just nothing they could do for him."
Mr Poole said another family member managed to free herself and raise the alarm, but Mr Dart was already dead.
The gang is believed to have cut the phone lines leading to the house before the attack and fled in a gardener's van.
Mr Seymour said police had not yet made any arrests, and appealed to the public for help.
He said: "We are right in the middle of our investigation into this situation and we are following some leads."
A spokeswoman for the Foreign Office said: "We are aware of the death of a British national in the Bahamas and were providing consular assistance."
The death was the sixth murder on Grand Bahama this year and 30 for all of the Bahamas, an island chain just off the south east coast of Florida.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article