Elderly Man Murdered by Drinking Buddy in Santa Elena

Police are investigating the death of sixty-one-year-old Ubaldo Guzman, after he was chopped to death on Thursday night. Guzman had been drinking at home in Santa Elena when an argument between him and his drinking companion turned violent. Reports are that Guzman attacked the other man with a machete before he seized it and chopped Guzman in self-defense, fatally injuring him. The perpetrator has since been taken into police custody while the matter is under investigation. News Five’s Britney Gordon has the story.

 

Britney Gordon, Reporting

A man is dead after a night of drinking turned into a violent episode between friends in Santa Elena Town. On September twelfth, around ten thirty p.m., the tiny wooden structure on Garcia Street that sixty-one-year-old Ubaldo Guzman called his home became the place of his death following an argument with a drinking companion. Guzman was chopped several times with a machete. Shamira Badillo, Guzman’s niece, got the news of her uncle’s death first thing in the morning.

 

Shamira Badillo, Neice of Deceased

“I had a miscall from his son about two this morning. He called me back about six this morning, he just told me that he had bad news for me, They killed my uncle, his dad. From there he said that the person is also at the hospital, but he said that my uncle passed away. Reaching at the hospital he bleed out. Just that he told me so far.”

 

Badillo explained that she was very close to her uncle and visited often. She does not know what the attacker’s relation is to her uncle.

 

Shamira Badillo

“All along the while, I knew that he lived by himself. I didn’t know someone was living with him. Right behind A & R, he lived deh. I know he mi di rent wa lee place deh. So until this morning I found out that they guy was living along with him.”

 

 

The incident occurred in the late hours of the night. Guzman’s neighbors were startled by the commotion occurring in the typically quiet neighborhood.

Voice of: Neighbor

“I basically was in my room. The house was already locked up. My boyfriend was sitting inside and he’s the one that heard the cry for help. We didn’t really come out, we just looked through the window and because we could see from the window that the door was open, we could see directly in the man’s house. We just saw a man, a figure over someone else on the floor. Now we didn’t see who it was, I couldn’t see the face clear, but that’s what we saw.”

 

Guzman’s neighbor was reluctant to have her boyfriend interfere with the scene as they were unsure of the circumstances. They opted instead to alert the police.

 

Voice of: Neighbor

“He was the one that said call for help. You need to call for help. Somebody ova deh need help. He went to the neighbor’s house and he urged her to call for help because somebody over there needs help. I told him don’t go over there you don’t want to get yourself hurt. So he stayed inside. We waited for the police to come. And he watched everything from the window. He was the one that was close to the man. I’ve met him like twice, so I knew it was an older guy who uses a cane and has issues with his hand and his leg.”

 

The perpetrator claims that he was acting out of self-defense, alleging that Guzman attacked him with the machete first.  But Badillo maintains that violence is out of character for her uncle, who she says is gentle and sickly. About a year ago, he was back and forth at the hospital, unable to use the bathroom without assistance from his family. He intended to undergo surgery to correct the issues with his hands.

 

Shamira Badillo

“He has issues with his hands. He was looking forward to that operation.”

 

Britney Gordon

“So he had issues with his hands. Was he able to hold things well? Did it give him pain? What kind of issues were it?”

 

Shamira Badillo

“He she it used to give him lots of pain. He can’t use that hand, so he only had the other hand weh he could use noh. So he used to suffer lot of pain with that hand.”

 

Guzman was a father of three and came from a large family. Badillo felt the death heavily as she had grown close to him during his time of illness.

 

Shamira Badillo

“With me, we were really close. Every time anything he used to call me. Sham this, Sham that. Like a week ago he call if we okay then he she he might go to Flores because he’s up and down to Belize to check for his hand but he was okay. He was a great uncle.”

 

The day after the incident, the quiet neighborhood has already returned to its usual serenity, but neighbors still recall the sounds of horror from the night before.

 

Britney Gordon

 “And you said you could hear him yelling. What was he saying?”

 

Voice of: Neighbor

“He started off with help help and then after that it was just screams.”

 

Britney Gordon for News Five.