San Pedro man arraigned for manslaughter by negligence in death of common law wife

Forty-one-year-old Maynor Ancona is out on bail after being arraigned on five criminal charges. Ancona is accused of causing the death of his partner, forty-six-year-old American National Jennifer Griffith, on Ambergris Caye. As we reported on April sixth, Ancona got into an altercation with another male individual at a bar on the island. During the altercation, Ancona allegedly picked up a conch shell and threw it at the person, but it caught Griffith in the head. That injury later led to her death. As a result, he was charged with manslaughter by negligence, disorderly conduct, two counts of harm and one count of wounding. He appeared before a magistrate in Belize City in the presence of his attorney, Orson “OJ” Elrington. In court, no plea was taken from Ancona for four of the five counts, apart from disorderly conduct for which he pleaded not guilty. There were no objections to bail being granted to Ancona by the Prosecutor who only asked for stringent conditions to be laid as the police investigation is ongoing at this time. With that, the sitting Senior Magistrate offered bail to Ancona in the sum of ten thousand dollars plus one surety of the same or two sureties of five thousand each, which he met. Elrington spoke with us following the arrangement. 

 

Orson Elrington, Attorney

“The allegation by the police is that there was a fight and that my client, there were coconut shells thrown and one of the shells hit the deceased and she died after that. My client denies that that is the facts and what happened. But of course, manslaughter by negligence is one of those cases that is not tried summarily. It has to be tried in the Supreme court and so no plea was taken for those charges and a number of charges that the DPP has to determine if those charges will be heard summarily or whether or not they will be heard by the high court. He has been in police custody for two plus days now and when I met with him he is still grieving because he lost his common law wife and he wanted to get out to make the necessary preparations for her funeral or to transport her body. That is his primary concern right now and still in the mourning process. Losing someone is never easy and especially under these circumstances where the authority has charged him for the death, and he feels unfairly so and it is obviously a very tough situation for him.”

Elmer Castro, the individual Ancona got into an altercation with at the bar was also charged for disorderly conduct and two counts of wounding.