And, though that brawl may have occurred between residents from two feuding communities, ComPol Williams says there has been an increasing number of public fights that are posing a challenge to cops. He spoke to one incident outside of a Belize City nightclub over the weekend involving a group of women. He says the physical altercation stemmed from a love triangle involving basketball athletes.
Chester Williams
Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
“I looked at the fight in front of Shisha over the weekend and again you can see where a number of ladies, engaged in a fight. From what I am told they are fighting over basketball players that come from abroad that they don’t even know. It makes you really wonder what we are coming to. Nonetheless some of them are in custody and they will be charged and taken before the courts today. I am proposing to the cabinet to increase the penalty for persons who are engaged in unlawful fights in public. I think the current penalty as stipulated in the law is too miniscule and there is a need for us to upgrade that and hopefully that can serve as a deterrent to people to know that if they engage in fights in public it is going to cost their pockets a lot of money.”
Reporter
“How does it make you feel to get all these footages being in the month of women month to see these things play out in public eyes.”
Chester Williams
“Well it is very dreadful to see that women are behaving in such a way. Normally in society we look up to women. All of us came from women and we expect the women among us are going to display behavior that are worthy of being emulated. But when we see women behaving in such a way it is very distasteful and whenever I get the video footage, I would send it to the police and tell them to arrest and charge. We cannot have a society where people have unlawful fights in public and go uncharged. That cannot be the order of the day.”
Goodnight and welcome to another edition of Sports Monday, I am Paul Lopez. We begin tonight’s coverage with an epic showdown of strength and discipline over the weekend inside the Saint John’s College Gymnasium. The Belize Powerlifting Association hosted its National Championships. Over the course of two days, twenty-one male and fourteen female powerlifters competed in their respective age and weight classes. For those who may be unfamiliar with the discipline, it entails three attempts and maximal weight on three lifts: squats, bench press, deadlifts.
Paul Lopez, Reporting
Most of these athletes prepare year-round for these competitions. After two days, winners were declared in each category, but the monster events were the male and female open. In the female open, Belize’s strongest female, Mary Gonzalez, won gold overall, Joylynne Smith secured the silver medal and Jaqueline Alas took home the bronze medal. In the male open, Belize’s strongest man, Kaylon Godoy took home gold, with an incredible seven hundred- and sixty-five-pounds deadlift. He had his young fans out showing support. Leo Matura showed tremendous improvements this year. He secured the silver medal, while Khalid Usher tool home the bronze medal. From powerlifting we move into some football action.
The William Dawson Peace Cup is in the eleventh week of its 2024 season. This weekend saw four games played inside the MCC Grounds. We bring you highlights from the match between Kelly Street FC and Fort George FC. The first forty-five minutes of the match between these two teams saw great defensive and offensive prowess on both ends of the field. No goals were scored at the end of the first half, though the competitiveness of these teams was on full display. Ten minutes into the second half, the ball finds number seventeen for Fort George at the top of the goal. Number eleven for Kelly Streets stays on his side. The ball appears to go out of bound and the defenders raises his arm. But there is no whistle and a kick from inside the penalty box by Devin Bermudez placed Fort George on top.
The referee got into a heated debate with players from Kelly Street FC that led to the issuance of two red cards, the involvement of police officers and a threat from the losing team to discontinue the match. Eventually cooler heads prevailed, and the match continued with Kelly Street down two players. At the seventy-fourth minute, Fort George’s Carlos Lino was brought down inside the penalty box from a hard tackle. The referee awarded him a penalty kick and he made it count. The match ended in favor of Fort George FC, three goals to two.
And finally for tonight, the Cycling Federation of Belize, in collaboration with the Belize Electricity Limited hosted the twenty-third annual Junior and Youth Cross Country Cycling Classic. The male riders raced from San Ignacio to Belize City. The female riders journeyed from La Democracia Village to Belize City. Just outside of Belmopan, Chavarria’s Cycling Team’s Kthan Gentle and PDP Development Racing’s Kevin Rojas have gained a significant lead and are on their own out front. An hour later and it’s still these two young riders maintaining the lead, while the chase group worked to close the gap.
With twenty miles left in the race, GFlow’s Jaylen Briceno emerged from the chase group and made contact with the two lead riders. Kthan Gentle was dropped at mile eleven, leaving Briceno and Rojas at front going into Belize City. Approximately one mile from the finish line, Rojas began cramping up and Jaylen Briceno took hold of the opportunity. Briceno crossed the finish line alone in first place. Rojas came behind him in second place, followed by Gflow’s Keith Enwright Junior in third place.
Jaylen Briceno
Jaylen Briceno, Junior Cross Country Champion
“This is definitely the hardest race of the season so far. My legs were cramping, I didn’t think I was gonna finish on top. I started praying when I crossed the bridge, please let something happen. Thank goodness the man cramped up right on the last stretch, that is when I took the advantage to attack on come into the line. Big kudos to my teammates, to all my family.”
Well folks, that is all we have for you in tonight’s coverage of Sports Monday. Catch you in the next one.
Ground was officially broken for the commencement of the Stake Bank Tourism Development Project back in 2018, and work got underway for the mega cruise facility shortly thereafter. But tonight, after investing north of one hundred million dollars, Port Coral, a Michael Feinstein initiative, has gone into receivership. Earlier today, News Five confirmed that a receiver had been appointed for the project during a meeting on Thursday. That individual is Marlowe Neal. The receivership is expected to last for a period of between six to nine months with a view to complete the construction of piers that would allow for cruise ships to berth at Stake Bank. But there is also multi-million dollar claim that had been brought against the Briceno administration prior to Stake Bank going into receivership. Earlier today, we caught up with Prime Minister John Briceño, who spoke briefly on the matter, as well as the status of a piece of legislation that was to have been introduced in place of the definitive agreement.
Prime Minister John Briceño
Prime Minister John Briceño
“When it comes to the issue of the receivership, that‘s a matter for the bank and I‘m sure that they may have their reasons why it is that they believe that they have to put the Stake Bank project in receivership. But, as we know, the main players behind the Stake Bank Project decided to sue the government and from what I am told there is really no case. So I can‘t understand why it is that they would want to sue the government.”
Reporter
“What do you believe this means for the cruise sector? Will Belize ever see a berthing port?”
Prime Minister John Briceño
“I do believe that we will. As we said, there are three areas: there is Stake Bank, there is Portico and also now there is the Port of Belize. And so, all of that is still remaining in play and we will see which is the one to be developed into a cruise port that can meet not only the needs for today, but also for ten, twenty years from today.”
Reporter
“This is the largest receivership, I believe, in Belize’s banking history. Do you think it will affect the banking sector, though?”
Prime Minister John Briceño
“No, it will not. The Central Bank has been very clear and also, so has Atlantic Bank. They have been very clear from day one that they are going to ensure that they protect every single cent of the depositors. So, no, I do not expect it to be a problem.”
Isani Cayetano
“PM, where are we with the legislation that’s forthcoming with respect of cruise tourism development in this country?”
Prime Minister John Briceño
“Well, nowhere. Until we know where we’re going, it does not make sense to pass this piece of legislation. We’re pretty much ready, but depending on which direction we will go then we may need to make some adjustments to that piece of legislation. So that is why we are holding on to it and we will deal with it when the time is appropriate.”
Reporter
“Notwithstanding that you say the claimants don’t have a case, has the government engaged with them? Have you met with them?”
Prime Minister John Briceño
“No, I have not met with them, but Mr. Feinstein did call me on Wednesday wanting to have a meeting, so I hope to meet with them next week.”
Prime Minister John Briceño is scheduled to meet with the Christian Workers Union on Monday to discuss the tumultuous state of affairs between the Port of Belize and the stevedores. As we reported earlier this week, employees of P.B.L. effected a work-to-rule after repeatedly demanding that government compensate them for sugar redundancies after the shipment of bulk sugar was relocated to Big Creek a few years ago. But G.O.B. remains resolute in its position and today PM Briceño echoed the sentiment that no one lost their job as a result of the transfer. Here’s what he had to say ahead of Monday’s meeting.
Prime Minister John Briceño
“I’ve had several with the stevedores and every time we meet, we come with an agreement but it seems that when they leave the meeting they come up with other issues. I said to them from the beginning, let‘s not talk about sugar or the sugar money. I said, you have your position and we have our position that there is no claim for no kind of redundancy. Nobody got fired, so there is no sugar money. But as a government, we are prepared to be able to address many of the pending issues between the stevedores and the Port of Belize so that we can modernize the port. The way the port has been running for the past ten, fifteen, twenty years, it‘s not in the interest of the port or in the interest of the country and I have been explaining to the stevedores, now we have competition, there is more than one port. So when you decide that you don‘t want to discharge a ship, the ship would either go back to their home country, quite likely the United States, or they go down south to discharge their container. That‘s what happened with sugar. So when they behave the way they do, they decide not to offload, they are shooting themselves in the foot. We need to be able to find common ground where we both, stevedores, Port of Belize and the Government of Belize, that we want to find how we could move this forward, how we could modernize and that is the intent, to protect their interest. I understand and we want to do that, that is why the government made an offer of one point five million dollars to say, listen, let‘s stop fighting about everything. Let‘s come up with the new working practices. You can‘t work more than fifteen hours and when you‘re finished working fifteen hours a new gang finishes if the ship is not finished offloading. Let‘s look at the number of gangs, the port wanted to bring it down to twelve, there‘s fourteen and the stevedores said they would not accept it. I said, okay, in the CBA that you have already signed you‘re talking about thirteen, okay, let‘s stay with thirteen. So we‘ve agreed to that. So, most of the things we‘ve agreed, they‘re just small little things.”
In the north, the Belize Sugar Cane Farmers Association has also issued a release in respect of the proposed commission of inquiry into the operations at the Belize Sugar Industries Limited. While government has been advised not to proceed with the probe, the B.S.C.F.A. has expressed its strong opposition to that recommendation and has gone on to criticize the Briceño administration. The Prime Minister told reporters earlier today that he would waste his time responding to the B.S.C.F.A.’s criticism.
Prime Minister John Briceño
Prime Minister John Briceño
“I will not waste my time in answering the BSCFA. I think and I will do what I believe is in the interest of the industry and in the interest of Belize. We have three other associations that are working with the sugar mill. They‘re not the only ones so let‘s start off with that. I have said to them that there has to be proper consultations. There were not proper consultations. The way the commission of inquiry, the terms of reference, the way it was set out, it was a terms of reference for the BSCFA. So I am meeting with the minister on Monday and on Monday we are going to finalize the terms and then we‘re going to proceed. But if we were to proceed the way they want us to proceed, we‘ll be wasting our time because we are going to be taken to court and the court is going tp rule against us. We are not going to appeal just because they asked us to appeal. We are going to appeal if there is a case and it seems as though there is not a case to appeal.”
On Thursday March fourteenth, sometime around nine fifteen p.m., police received reports of a shooting outside of the Punta Gorda sports auditorium. Officers visited the area and encountered Police Constable Feliz Fernandez attached to the Toledo Formation. PC Fernandez reported that he, along with his common-law wife, went to watch a basketball game. According to Fernandez, they sat on the bleachers and a while later they were harassed by one Richard Valerio who is his common-law’s ex- partner, who was shouting profanities to them, including saying, “somebody will die tonight”. Fernandez went on to say that to avoid a confrontation, they moved to another area. However, they were accosted by Valerio, who continued with his profanities. Fernandez further stated that he decided to leave and asked a fellow officer to escort him to his vehicle. Fernandez claims that Valerio later inflicted damage to his car which was parked outside of the auditorium, by shattering the windshield with rocks. The report further states that PC Fernandez ordered Richard Valerio to drop the rock, that is when Richard Valerio threw a rock in PC Fernandez’s direction but missed. Fernandez then claims that, fearing for his life, he drew his licensed mine millimeter pistol and fired a single shot in Valerio’s direction. Valerio then ran inside the complex area and was then immediately rushed by police to the Punta Gorda Hospital for medical treatment for injuries to his lower back. We spoke with the sister of the victim, who wishes to remain unnamed. She stated that contrary to Fernandez’s account, her brother had not approached or interacted with the officer. According to her, her brother had been the victim of multiple incidents of harassment from the officer and had even been assaulted previously inside his home. Accusations are that the dispute ignited over a shared romantic partner and that her brother had been on the receiving end of injustice for several months now. Commissioner of Police has ordered an internal investigation concurrent with the criminal investigation into this incident. An update will be provided at the end of the investigation. The firearm was retrieved for ballistic testing.
He murdered his mother, sister and stepfather in November 2012 and since then, has tried everything to stall the case by changing several attorneys, requesting two sentence indications and frustrated a trial judge to the point of recusing himself from the case. But today, thirty-six-year-old Jared Ranguy opted not to stand trial and instead entered a guilty plea via a teleconference session from the Belize Central Prison. It was an emotional morning and a packed courtroom before High Court Justice, Nigel Pilgrim. News Five’s Marion Ali was there and filed this report.
Marion Ali, Reporting
Jared Ranguy, who had for many years tried to usurp the justice system, by firing his attorneys to force adjournments, has finally decided not to let his court matter languish any longer by pleading guilty, instead of going to a trial. Relatives of the three deceased persons sobbed as Ranguy admitted to the court that he murdered his mother, Karen Skeen, his sister, Teena Skeen and his stepfather, Robert Vellos, as they slept inside their home in Ladyville. In responding to questions posed by High Court Judge, Nigel Pilgrim, Ranguy told the court that he indeed murdered his three family members and that he did so without provocation. He said that he was admitting to the triple murder without being coerced by anyone to do so, and that he was pleading guilty because he is guilty of the crime. When the judge asked the Director of Public Prosecutions, Cheryl-Lynn Vidal, who sat in for Crown Counsel Riis Cattouse, to read the details of the three murders, Ranguy told the court that it wasn’t necessary because he was admitting to wilfully killing his family. The facts were read anyway, in order that he could agree to the sequence of events and admit guilt. D.P.P Vidal told reporters that she expected today’s outcome.
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal, Director of Public Prosecutions
“I think that we anticipated [this] because of the way the discussions were going that we would have reached this point.”
Marion Ali
“And this came after many years of adjournments and change of attorneys and a previous sentence indication and even a judge recusing himself.”
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal
“Yes, I imagine that the prisoner, we can call him now, would have taken a very long time to come to terms with what the sentence might look like if he pleaded guilty to three counts of murder. Whatever operated on his mind in recent months that led him to this point.”
This point for the family was also one that they had waited almost twelve years to see. While they were still very shaken, Karen Skeen’s brother, Rene Skeen, told reporters that they were consoled by his nephew’s guilty plea.
Rene Skeen
Rene Skeen, Brother of Deceased
“We’d like to thank God. The most important thing, we got justice. And the emotions, that’s – you can’t explain it. It’s been over 11 years we’ve been waiting for this, and the day has finally come. We will never get full justice. Three people are dead, but for him pleading guilty, it helped a little bit. The pain – we can deal with it a little bit better now.”
Skeen said the guilty plea saved the family a lot more heartaches than if there had been a trial.
Rene Skeen
“The family wouldn’t have to go relive what happened 11 years ago. We would have to be in court seeing guns, knives, bloody clothes, everything. We believe in the system. We’ve been doing interviews with you guys for years and years. We have family members coming from the U.S just for court every six, eight months, nine months, so after trying to manipulate the system for so long, justice caught up with him. Although we would like to see no parole at the end of the day, like I said, for the family, we got what we were requesting for him to say, look, I’m guilty. We used to say that. You guys interviewed us and we said, you guys asked, can we forgive him? I used to say no, but now you know what? I think I can.”
Ranguy’s decision came after he had gotten a sentence indication from Justice Pilgrim on March first. In that sentence indication, Justice Pilgrim informed Ranguy that if he entered a guilty plea, he could get three life sentences without the possibility of parole until after forty years, minus the eleven years that he has served behind bars. Vidal said that the guilty plea has saved considerable time because of what that process would have entailed.
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal
“There were quite a number of witnesses who would have had to have been called. There would have been voir dires in relation to the statement that would have been given admissions that were made. So it did save the court some time, but of course this matter has been before the court for a very long time.”
Rene Skeen says that moving on now will be a bit easier for the survivors.
Marion Ali
“Now this has taken a toll on all of you. We heard the subs in the courtroom. How are you all coping now?”
Rene Skeen
“Man, today the family decided to meet no matter what would have happened today for a prayer meeting. It’s going to be a good prayer meeting today. We’re going to cope better now.”
Marion Ali for News Five.
Justice Pilgrim has ordered that a psychiatric evaluation be conducted on Ranguy and that the Belize Central Prison present a report on him. As the D.P.P. pointed out, the sentence indication is not the actual sentence. Ranguy’s attorney, Senior Counsel Godfrey Smith has until April twenty-second to submit a mitigation plea in writing and the court was adjourned until May thirteenth.
This week, we reported on the matter involving Aaron Wilson, who was detained for almost a day on grounds that he was boisterous towards a police officer when he confronted her at the police station in Ladyville. As it turned out, the police officer had hung up the phone on Wilson and he went to the station to tell her about it. Well, Wilson was held for about twenty-two hours, and following that, Crown Counsel, Riis Cattouse fired off a letter to the Commissioner of Police, Chester Williams in which he criticized the police for what he felt was frequent violation of the human rights of persons who are detained. The matter did not sit well with Williams or the Minister of Home Affairs, Kareem Musa, who both thought it was unfortunate that Cattouse had that to say. Today, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Cheryl-Lynn Vidal told reporters that it is not what Cattouse said that she had a problem with, but the way he went about it.
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal, Director of Public Prosecutions
“Whenever a file is being advised on and there has been any impropriety on the part of the police, the [Crown] Counsel would write about it in their memoranda. Perhaps this is the first time it has been sent to the media.”
Reporter
“Okay, so this is standard practice for the Crown Counsel to engage the Commissioner in this manner?”
Cheryl-Lyn Vidal
“I don’t think the Commissioner directly, but anytime a file is sent to the office and there is some evidence of impropriety on the part of the police and the Counsel will speak on it. I do not believe that Counsel has in the past written directly to the Commissioner in that manner, but it is not as though the DPP’s office is in the habit of endorsing police impropriety.”
Reporter
“Do you endorse the fact that Crown Counsel Cattouse decided, you know what, this is a matter that I should, and he took it upon himself to write to the Commissioner of Police?”
The General Legal Council has decided following a complaint brought against a Belizean attorney by another retired attorney of New Zealand. That lawyer, Jinyue Young, had alleged that attorney-at-law, Bryan Neal failed to update Mister Young on the status of a matter for which Neal was retained in March 2023. In that case, Young was hired to act against a tenant of Young’s who had owed rent arrears. The Council found that while Neal had adequate time to provide written evidence in response to the allegation to the council when the complaint was served on him, he didn’t do so. The council dealt with the matter on February ninth and after listening to both sides, found that Neal had breached, among others, rule twenty-eight, one, which stipulates that an attorney must deal with their clients’ business as expeditiously as possible and must provide their clients with full information on the progress of the clients’ business. The Council also found that in correspondence from Neal, he did not indicate that he would not deal with the matter for Young, who had paid him five thousand dollars to deal with the matter for him. Neal, however, has refunded Young the money in full and has also offered to help find an attorney who would be able to take on the job.
A vacancy is being advertised for the highest position at B.T.L., that’s for a new Chief Executive Officer. In today’s edition of the Amandala Newspaper, a full-page ad was published inviting interested candidates to apply for the post. This means that C.E.O. Ivan Tesucum who assumed the post five years ago is stepping down. Tesucum has been with the telecoms provider for over twenty years and has distinguished himself in leadership with financial and operation experience in Belize and the United States. Tesucum was promoted to C.E.O. in 2019 after serving as Chief financial officer since 2012.
