Noralez Charged For Brutal Attack on Elderly Man
Patrick Grant
Ninety-three-year-old Patrick Grant is recovering tonight, following a brutal attack over the weekend in which he was badly beaten by his neighbor during a home invasion. The elderly man regained consciousness earlier today and is undergoing a battery of tests, including a CT scan, to determine the extent of his injuries. On Sunday morning, around six o’clock, businessman Carlos Diaz was alerted of an incident involving his father-in-law at his home on Fern Lane, in Lake Independence. There, he observed Grant sitting near the front of the bungalow. The main door had been breached and several of his belongings, along with a television set, were also missing. Grant had been pummeled, his face badly bruised after being struck repeatedly. In the wake of the vicious attack, thirty-five-year-old Chester Noralez, a next door neighbor, was detained for questioning. Noralez, a former inmate with an extensive rap sheet, remained in police custody after being found with the television. This afternoon, the construction worker appeared before Senior Magistrate Sharon Fraser and was arraigned on charges of burglary and dangerous harm. During the indictment, Noralez admitted to being in possession of the stolen television but denied breaking into Grant’s home and assaulting him.
Chester Noralez
He contends that the item was bought from an unknown person the night before the incident and was only in the process of checking to see if it was indeed functional when police busted him. While his attacker may have been apprehended and is spending time in pretrial detention, there are more questions than answers in the case involving the elderly Grant. During a subsequent investigation, a spent condom, as well as a wrapper, was retrieved from the residence, leading Grant’s family to believe that he may have been sexually assaulted. For context, here’s what Diaz told News Five on Monday.
Carlos Diaz
Carlos Diaz, Son-in-law [File: December 28th, 2015]
“They found used condoms with semen in the house and condom wrappings and the chair, like I told you, the chair that he was sitting in, when he got up, when they took him up to put him in the ambulance there was blood, a lot of blood in the chair. So I cannot say anything positive to that until we get a report from the medical authorities and they are not in any hurry to do that. They say they have more important things to do. My wife has requested it from them, but they say they have more important things to do, so we can’t do anything more than that; that’s just speculation.”
This afternoon, News Five spoke with Grant’s daughter, Gilda Diaz, who said that notwithstanding the absence of charges for the alleged sex crime, her father may have been sodomized. She questions the presence of the used protection found inside her father’s home, as well as the possibility that that aspect of the criminal investigation may be swept under the rug to avoid a further incident. Despite being able to receive bail for the offenses, Noralez was remanded into custody at the Belize Central Prison until February second.
