The incident harkens back to a similar ordeal faced by a pair of men who were stopped and randomly searched by police officers in Belize City. It was later determined by the courts that the officers abused their powers. According to Mendez, the right to record is central to the case that is before the High Court.
Leslie Mendez
Leslie Mendez, Attorney-at-law
“I think that if we recall the case of Greg Nunez and Bryton Codd, it dealt with a similar issue with respect to arbitrary searches. In that case, the court had actually identified the use of acts such as the Misuse of Drugs Act and the Firearms Act. [It] had identified that the department seems to, had identified the misuse of these acts. I’ll just leave it at that, as a systemic problem within the department and in fact the judge in that case recommended that training be conducted for police officers to be able to understand how they can use these acts and what needs to be established in order for them all to utilize these acts and their search powers under these acts appropriately and specifically what really constitutes reasonable suspicion. So that was the issue in that case and to some extent, yes, we see it arising in this case as well. What is different in this case, though, is that we are also raising the issue of the right to record. That was not present in that case and what we are inviting the court to find, and we rely on a couple of authorities in some jurisdictions, that say that the right to record is encompassed in the right to freedom of expression.”
Police are still seeking one suspect in connection with the Saturday night murder of Clint Castillo in Cotton Tree Village. As we have reported, twenty-two-year-old Jamal Hyde was charged with two counts of abetment to commit murder. The second suspect is in hiding and authorities are working to find him. ComPol Williams gave reporters an update on that search.
Chester Williams
Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
“We are still looking for the person who is the suspect in that matter. We receive tips occasionally on his whereabouts. But to every time we respond he is not found. I had personally gone to the mother to ask if she would be able to assist in locating her son. She has pledged that she is going to do her best to do so. But in the meantime we continue our efforts to try and locate him. He is now on our five most wanted list. So you would know that he is of great priority to us.”
Reporter
“Is it gang related?”
Chester Williams
“It is not gang related. They are a group that hangs together. They are all friends. Apparently there was an argument that started between them and that led to the young man Hyde, that was charged, handing a weapon to the alleged murdered and the alleged murderer carried out the act. So it is not a matter of them being gang members. They are employed people and they had some argument between themselves.”
Reporter
“Is it a personal disappointment for you that this is the first time Cotton Tree has been under an SOE and right under the SOE there is a murder.”
Chester Williams
“Again, we have to understand that SOEs are not designed to stop every crime from happening. If you have an SOE and a wife and husband has an issue at home and one kill the other, how do you expect the SOE is going to stop that? The objective of the SOE is to go after the persons who are known to give problems in the area continuously. It is not just to look at somebody and say oh he looks like he has a gun and pick them up and lock them up. If we were to do that then you would be the first one to prance on the police and say we ware just picking up people. These are people who are employed together, they are friends, They were at a yard hanging out ,enjoying themselves and an argument started. How do you expect police to stop that? To say that it is different than a wife and husband it is not different. There are certain things that will happen outside of the preventative measures of the police and when it happens you have to make sure we find a way to deal with it, as simple as that.”
The Leader of the Opposition says the Commissioner of Police is not being honest about Belize’s current crime stats. He added that Belize is on a downward spiral where major crimes are concerned, while accusing the Commissioner of Police and the Minister of Home Affairs of not having a solution. With several murders having occurred under the current state of emergency, Shyne Barrow says Belize is nearing its worst citizen security crisis yet.
Moses “Shyne” Barrow
Moses “Shyne” Barrow, Leader of the Opposition
“We see crime continuing the downward spiral as far as going to edge of where we have ever been with citizens security. I saw that your brother Vasquez and the commissioner last week in debating the forty percent increase, which is what the statistics tell you, and the ComPol saying no it is less. We have had four murders since I had the last press briefing and we are still in a state of emergency. So, the police department under the stewardship of the commissioner has no solution for crime.”
On Tuesday, the Leader of the Opposition also said that he believes the Commissioner of Police is abusing his authority against his own brother, Arthur Williams. As we have reported, Arthur Williams has been dragged before the court on a couple occasions to answer charges under the Cyber Crimes Act. That is after he made comments on social media towards ComPol Williams that are allegedly defamatory. In response to Barrow, the commissioner says the Opposition Leader is speaking on a matter he knows nothing about and has his own issues with Nathania Ruben to worry about.
Chester Williams
Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
“The leader of the opposition and Arthur Roy are the same. The truth is that hespoke of something he knows nothing about. He, does not know what is the issue. But as usual he always has an opinion about everything. But you know I am not Shyne’s greatest problem. The lady from the states with the Diddy shooting. Nathania Ruben, she is his problem. I am going to be in the backburner and just watch how that play out. The lady says she has everything on the man so I am just going to wait to see when everything comes out. So, he is worried about me, let him worry about his problem that is coming.”
A twenty-six-year-old man is dead, following a traffic accident that involved two vehicles, a motorbike, and a cow on the Hummingbird Highway. Reports are that on Friday night, Lokenver Montero was riding his motorcycle on the highway when he crashed into a dead cow. The cow was killed after two vehicles crashed into it five minutes earlier. Montero was rushed to hospital and spent the weekend fighting for his life. He passed away on Tuesday. ComPol Williams weighed in on the incident and the criminal charges that livestock owners can face in such an instance.
Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
“It is a really difficult situation. I myself occasionally almost run into a cow or horse on the highway. Sometimes you just see them pop up right in front of you. It is very frightening. I would just appeal to the owners of these animals to do the best they can to keep them off the highways. Sometimes they tend to tie them on the edge of the highway and then the animal ends up getting lose and ventures on to the road. That is extremely dangerous. It has to start with the owners of these animals but if it is that we were to establish who the owners of these animals are I think there is a way we would be able to bring charges against those owners. They have a legal responsibility to ensure that the animals are secure and does not pose a danger to the public. So, I am sure there is something we can do if we establish who the owner is.”
There has been a cybercrime legislation in place since October seventh, 2020. It covers a broad spectrum of offences and deals with any kind of electronic data that one transmits through a computer or electronic device, including cell phones. Cyberbullying, such as what call centre agent, Brian Perriott Junior is charged, is only one form of cybercrime. In this week’s edition of our Five Point Breakdown, we turned to an attorney to expound on not only cyberbullying, but cybercrime. Marion Ali reports.
Marion Ali, Reporting
You’ll remember Brian Perriott Junior, who was remanded on Friday after he pleaded guilty to intentionally sending another person nude pictures of an ex-girlfriend without her consent. It happened after the young woman ended a relationship with Perriott virtually in June. Three nights behind bars and hearing that he was looking at a five-year-sentence was enough for the twenty-six-year-old to change his mind, and his plea. When he appeared in court for what was to be his sentencing, he decided to plead not guilty. Perriott lawyered up and got bail on several conditions, including that he is not to engage in any publications on any social media platform regarding the case. There have been quite a few cyberbullying incidents in the recent past. At the end of June, images of a popular Belizean couple and several young women went viral. Before that, a woman, Jemine Thurton was charged in May with defrauding Celebrity Restaurant. The offenses are serious, but there are other less popular forms of cybercrime. Attorney, Audrey Matura defines what cybercrime is.
What is Cybercrime?
Audrey Matura
Audrey Matura, Attorney at Law
“The cybercrime legislation deals with any kind of electronic data that you transmit through a computer. And a computer doesn’t mean only a desktop. Even your phone is considered, for the purpose of the legislation, a technology that is within the realm of a computer. And so it involves people creating fake identities to be able to online. People using their device or computer, whatever, to fabricate false information, to steal your data, to steal your identity, even to lure minors into doing things that are not proper. It’s actually very wide. That is why it’s called cybercrime. It’s crimes that are committed using the technology. Crimes of theft, identity theft is a huge one; crimes of sexual solicitation, especially against minors.”
Penalties Range from Fines to Confinement
The penalties for cybercrimes vary from fines to imprisonment of up to ten years, depending on the types of offences committed, and they can be tried summarily by a magistrate or by a High Court judge. The list of cybercrimes is lengthy. For example, were you aware that if you gained access to a computer system or data without permission you are committing a cybercrime?
Audrey Matura
“I just read through some of the offenses so that people are aware of theirs. Illegal access to computer system. Illegal access to computer data. Illegal data interference. Illegal system interference. Illegal devices and codes. Computer related forgery. Identity related fraud. Identity related theft and child luring. And of course, the others you already knew.”
Media Houses Beware
Then there’s an aspect of cybercrime that holds media houses responsible for derogatory comments that individuals make on their social media pages.
Audrey Matura
“Sometimes I see some of the most outrageous comments calling people thieves, rapists, and all kinds of things with no evidence. The onus is on the media houses to go remove those things because then they can be arrested and charged. There is provision.”
Marion Ali
“For?”
Audrey Matura
“To me it would be under Section 15, so you can be charged as an individual and you can still be charged as a corporation so you can’t hide and say oh it is a company or so you can’t charge me.”
Marion Ali
“What would be the charge?”
Audrey Matura
“[Section] 15 says using a computer system to coerce, harass, intimidate, etc., a person, but this is the part that I think of the most. It says a person commits an offense who uses a computer system (and that could be your phone) to a publish or transmit computer data that is obscene, vulgar, profane, lewd, lascivious, or indecent with the intent. So what is the intention? It has to be that you want to humiliate the person. You want to harass the person or cause substantial emotional distress, or cause the other person to be subjected to public ridicule, contempt, hatred, or embarrassment.”
You Could Be Charged for your Fake Account
What is difficult to litigate against, Matura says, are social media posts that don’t call any names but are offensive to a class of people. But what is not difficult to prosecute are people who create fake Facebook accounts.
Audrey Matura
“People make fake accounts and they put fake names. And so you need to – the police has actually has the ability.”
Marion Ali
That’s a crime too?
Audrey Matura
“Yes, that in itself is a crime, but the police have the ability to be able to track these things. And they should there is a protocol that I understand that you can contact Facebook for police purposes and get information. There’s ways if you want to do it.”
But the attorney questions whether Belize is equipped to successfully prosecute cybercrimes.
Successfully Prosecuting Cybercrimes
Audrey Matura
“The question is, do we have the resources? Does the office of the DPP have the resources of what it needs for the technology to prosecute? Does the police have the resources to investigate and gather good evidence? Because you have to gather the evidence. Keeping in mind, too, that there is already legislation that has to do with electronic evidence and for you to be able to admit electronic evidence in any hearing. It requires that you do it within the parameters of the evidence of the electronic evidence.”
The Belize City Council is bolstering its efforts to reduce unemployment within the city. This morning, the City Council and Peak Outsourcing International Belize Limited signed a Memorandum of Understanding to establish a partnership aimed at enhancing job placement and career development opportunities for Belize City residents. Through this partnership, participants will have the opportunity to partake in workshops and training that will assist them in entering the workforce. News Five’s Britney Gordon attended the ceremony today, to learn more about this endeavor and how it will assist Belizeans currently living in poverty.
Britney Gordon, Reporting
Underemployment, food insecurity and lack of access to health and education are some of the primary indicators used to measure poverty in through The Multidimensional Poverty Index. These are challenges over one fourth of Belize’s population is currently facing. According to the Statistical Institute of Belize, SIB, the country has seen around a ten point one decline in poverty between 2021 and 2023, however, there is still much that can be done to reduce the numbers. Earlier this year, Christian Orellana, a statistician at SIB gave us more insight into those figures.
Christian Orellana
Christian Orellana, Statistician II, S.I.B.
“For the period September 2023 the incidence of multidimensional poverty is twenty-six point four percent. That means that twenty-six point four percent of the population is multidimensional poor. The intensity of multidimensional poverty is thirty-eight point four percent. That means that on average, a poor household had a deprivation score of thirty-eight point four percent. And our national MPI is zero point one zero one. We can also look at poverty statistics in two ways, for the total population of the country and for the households of the country, a total of one hundred three thousand nine hundred forty-four persons were multidimensional poor among twenty-four thousand ninety-six households.”
To combat this issue, the Belize City Council has partnered with Peak Outsourcing International Limited, a business solutions firm, to provide training and technical programs for residents of Belize City who are in pursuit of a career. Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City, explains why he thought it important to sign on to the project.
Bernard Wagner
Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City
“We have been the sort of entity which really want to drive and contribute to reducing unemployment in our city. We have done it, as you see, through Being Your Own Boss initiative contributing to having people run their own little business but at the same time there are some people who want to enter and seek a career and what better place than Peak Outsourcing they have been very proactive. They have demonstrated to us that they are here for the long haul from the mere fact that you are able to establish a corporate center in the city that says a lot of how you take this business and how you see yourself being a part of the Belize City whole fabric of Belize City employment. And so we, we wanted to ensure that we contribute to youths coming out of high school coming out of universities every year. There are so many of them coming out of universities and this is a career opportunity and we wanted to be a part of it.”
The Belize City Council will assist Peak Outsourcing with finding participants to be trained in various skills and strengthen their resumes through community-based activities. Orson Picart, Senior Talent Acquisition specialist explained how CitCo and Peak will see this collaboration through.
“Mostly it’s to provide a funnel. Peak outsourcing, and it’s not only about recruitment to it also has to do with the other community based initiatives that we’re actually partnering on to make sure that once again, we could build the competencies of qualified individuals to make sure that they have placement. Where there are different social projects, we definitely want to be a part of those sort of different initiatives that the Belize City Council has in place, we are going to be partnering with them to see how best we can lend resources and collaborate to make the events a little bit more bigger.”
Some may criticize the rapid growth of the BPO industry in Belize, but it has become one of the primary sources of employment for many young professionals. Wagner says that this is a positive step towards reducing unemployment.
Bernard Wagner
“The fact of the matter is that we once used to complain about employment opportunities. We have seen where employment, unemployment has reduced. So the last figure I saw was a close to three percent. This is a part of that whole effort to have our graduates, young people have job opportunities. It will never always be about government providing the job opportunities, but the private sector, being your own boss, private sector, these are all part of the whole system that contribute.”
Wagner stresses the importance of acknowledging call centers as legitimate careers as they continue to fill the gaps of employment in Belizean society. Angel Burke, an employee at Peak Outsourcing, told us that she began as a call agent and has since moved up in her field.
Angel Burke
Angel Burke, Talent Acquisition Specialist
“It has impacted my life in a very big way because here at Peak Outsourcing, we have a different culture. We base on positivity. We base on respect, professionalism, knowledge, a lot of different stuff.”
Britney Gordon
“And your daily life, how has that bled over into that being able to know that you have a secure job that you’re content and happy and satisfied with?”
Angel Burke
“Definitely stability because I see myself in this position doing good for myself and for my son. One day they can look up and see that’s my mama. She do interviews for peak outsourcing.”
The E-mobility Pilot Project is coming soon to Belize City and City Hall is asking the public to bet patient as they analyze parts of the project that will be best for the country. The new eco-friendly electric buses will be outfitted with several features such as wi-fi and air conditioning, leading to concerns regarding the affordability of the services. Mayor Bernard Wagner says that he anticipates criticism, but assures the public that the council will use the first run to determine how it can be improved with time. Here’s more on that.
Bernard Wagner
Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City
“When change comes, people complain, but you have to embrace change. We want to transform the public transportation system at least in the city It has been over fifty years that we have not seen any sort of Growth, any sort of development in the transport system. We have an opportunity here, man, and we have to embrace it. Where you are able to have the residents of the city drive in a modern bus, which is efficient, reliable eco-friendly less pollution in the air. You are able to track it via the app that we have in place on it. And it makes life easier. We have many capabilities for wheelchair commuters. It will have Wi Fi, it will be AC. It’s just a pilot project. I continuously to say that it’s a pilot project. It will inform scaling up opportunities for the city when we reach that point. We have not reached that point yet. I don’t see why people are looking way ahead, two, three years ahead. Let the e mobility pilot project work first. Let us get the required data, which will inform scaling up.”
Reporter
“But you can see how they were concerned, though, because there was a meeting, and there are minutes of meeting, pointing to some entity. That’s What I took from what was in those meetings because it wasn’t clear, but they’re talking about the formation of an entity of which the City Council would own fifty-one percent and I think that is what maybe they stretched a little to say that they would be required to give up a majority shares.”
Bernard Wagner
“That’s far from it. I Just hear that narrative over and over we are doing the pilot project. Let’s focus on the pilot project first. When we reach that road, we will cross that bridge.”
Recently, the Mayor of Belize City announced that the Belize City Council has plans to create an app that would allow Belizeans living in the diaspora to better manage their assets and stay up to date with paying their taxes. According to Mayor Wagner, the app will provide an ease of connectivity and maintain their relationship with the city. We spoke with Wagner today, who believes that once people are able to access their bills, they will be more inclined to pay.
Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City
“Yeah, we have substantial residents who live abroad who has properties or who own properties or who may have become, through estate may have become the owners of properties and what we see is a lot of them being abandoned and so we are trying to put in place the, like I discussed earlier put together a Belize City Council app which will connect those living abroad directly into the system and be able to really interact and see their statements. If you are a customer who engages in trade, in property, in liquor your driver’s license, you’ll be able to have a dashboard, which clearly show you all your relationship with the city and be able to track it. I always believe that if you are seeing what you owe in front of you every day, you are more compelled to pay. And so if you are able to access that app and you see the interest building up on your property, that’s, you are more compelled to say, I need to pay this through this app. Of course through merchant accounts and get it into the city.”
In June of this year, the Belize City Council was issued a letter demanding payment to the tune of four hundred and fifty-nine thousand, seven hundred and twenty-four dollars. This letter came from Antonio Novelo, former owner of Novelo’s Bus Line. Novelo claims that the council never paid the amount owed to him after a court ruling in 2007. Previously in an interview, Mayor Wagner said that he was not able to find any proof of such a ruling, but agreed to pay the bill if it was proven to be legitimate. Today, when asked about the situation, Wagner questioned why the bill is being brought forward now and why he should be the one to pay.
Bernard Wagner
Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City
“That has been on the books from 2007. We are in 2024. 2027 I dih leave I don’t know who will pay it. You understand?”
Reporter
“You don’t know mayor but you did put out a release saying if that was real, you would address it though. I don’t know what happened, but you said you would.”
Bernard Wagner
“But 2007, why bring it 2024?”
Reporter
“They say that the attorneys are behind them.”
Bernard Wagner
“How many mayors you had before me?”
Reporter
“Two.”
Bernard Wagner
“Did they pay?”
Bernard Wagner
“They didn’t.”
Bernard Wagner
“So why would I pay?”
Reporter
“One claims that they don’t know about it even though they were the attorney for the other side.”
Bernard Wagner
“Listen to me, I’m tired of paying people bills.”
Reporter
“You’re tired of paying, but it is a bill.”
Britney Gordon
“So you’re saying because of, how old it is, it’s no longer legitimate?”
Bernard Wagner
“I have my legal people looking at that, but I don’t even have that in my head. Period.”
