Mother Karima Williams Overwhelmed and Relieved

Kelvin Usher

As we said, tonight Kelvin Usher is safe at home, reunited with his family. Missing since Sunday, the teenager surfaced this morning, according to police, not far from where he disappeared when the Gang Suppression Unit busted a marijuana farm on Lucky Strike, Belize District. The Saint John’s College Junior College student was with his father, Cameron Usher Senior, when the GSU raid occurred just before midday on September twenty-fourth.  For days, the nation was seized as search parties combed the area where he was last seen and the story of his reappearance this morning brought national relief, even as questions still linger on the way he was located this morning by his father. We start our detailed coverage of today’s events with an interview with his mother, Karima Williams, who spoke to News Five’s Duane Moody, following his return.  Williams says he was found near Santa Martha.

Duane Moody, Reporting

There was a collective sigh of relief by family members and friends this morning after word spread like wildfire that missing Belize City minor, Kelvin Usher, was safe at home. Just before nine a.m. today, the seventeen-year-old surfaced in Santa Martha Village, Orange Walk some twenty-two miles away from where he went missing in Lucky Strike Village along the Old Northern Highway. Unconfirmed reports were that a person wearing dreadlocks was spotted in the area.

Karima Williams

Karima Williams, Mother of Kelvin Usher

“I got word. They said he was found at this mile and that mile. Oh no, it is not true. It was confusing. I stopped answering my phone and I said no, I’m going to wait. I had two people when I heard it; the bus was already here for us to go up to Santa Martha, wherever they said it was. And then I said let’s wait and do our part and see. I wasn’t the one that was up there because at the same time they were having a rally at SJC that I had to go over there and speak. I got the word on my way back from there to tell me to come and see him and we’re here and that’s when I saw him.”

For days Kelvin made it through the elements of the wild, but not without abrasions from thorns and dehydration.  Over a hundred persons combed the area near mile thirty-one on the Old Northern Highway in search of the minor, speculating that he had been injured, but hoping for the best.

Karima Williams

“He’s talking here and there, he has to hydrate. A lot of stuff with him and we have to just work on that.”

Duane Moody

“I understand that he mi di hear unu when unu mi deh out there di shout.”

Karima Williams

“He said there was a time when he heard us and then he said he heard like something fly and then he wondered if it was a helicopter or mommy maybe with a plane and so he said he tried to put his socks on something and trying to push it up to see, but it wasn’t that; maybe one of the bigger airplanes flying out or something so. And ih say one spell he heard the dog…like he heard people.”

Duane Moody

“He neva shout out to anybody….”

Karima Williams

“No…he said tired and hungry and everything in one. But he did well. God is good and like I said, they kept him and they brought him back.”

Karima Williams says that she is happy that her son is alive and grateful for the support from residents and friends.

Karima Williams

“I’m overwhelmed. My son is alive; he is found alive. God is good. everybody…all of you people, Belize City, America…everybody from all walks prayed for him to come home safe and don’t give up hope. And I am so grateful. We are still going to do the candle vigil. We are not just going to do the patrol. We are going to be out there at Battlefield Park at six o’clock giving thanks. Hopefully we can bring Kelvin along to say thanks to everybody and stuff like that. But I am truly grateful to everybody. Words cannot describe, I cannot tell the words to explain how I feel. Thanks. Thanks to Belize; thanks to everybody.”

Duane Moody for News Five.