Brandon Hughes, 18, Charged with Murder of Oscar Rosado, 70
Brandon Hughes
After spending a night in lock-down, eighteen-year-old Brandon Hughes was taken to court this morning and arraigned before Chief Magistrate Sharon Fraser for the murder of well-known businessman, Oscar Rosado Senior. Police are actively looking for two other suspects who remain at large. Hughes was picked up at his house on Aloe Vera Street and singled out in an identification parade which, he says, he did not want to participate in. The businessman was shot and killed on April twenty-third as he went to the rescue of his wife Elena at Rosado’s Hardware on Cemetery Road. She was being held at gunpoint by a trio of men intending to commit robbery. News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.
Oscar Rosado Sr.
Isani Cayetano, Reporting
The mid-afternoon murder of Oscar Rosado Sr., inside his hardware and construction supply store on April twenty-third, sent shockwaves across the business community. The seventy-year-old had been shot and killed in cold blood as he came to his wife’s defense. A trio of armed robbers had entered the establishment on Cemetery Road and held Elena Rosado at gunpoint. Her elderly husband was out on the compound preparing a delivery for a customer when he happened upon the robbery in progress. The thieves shot him at close range, rummaged his pockets and made off with his wallet. Irate and distraught, Elena spoke with the media moments later.
Elena Rosado
Elena Rosado, Wife of Deceased
“If I woulda get my hands with this bwai ya, I noh wahn shot ahn, yoh undastand mi, I noh wahn shot ahn because I know dah who. But when I hold he, I sorry fu he, because when I done wid he, he wahn cyant shoot nobody else, because I wahn bruk ih two hand and I wahn bruk ih two foot.”
Earlier today, eighteen-year-old Brandon Hughes appeared in one piece before Chief Magistrate Sharon Frazer where he was arraigned for the murder of the well-known businessman. It is believed that along with two others, he perpetrated the dastardly act of killing the hardworking patriarch of the Rosado family.
Elena Rosado
“My husband was a good man. If he mi need money and he mi ask my husband fi wahn hundred dollars, my husband mi wahn give ahn di money, because maybe he mi have one thousand dollars eena ih wallet. That’s all he mi got deh wid he, yoh undastand me, so fu mek dehn kill you fu one thousand dollars that noh worth di while, yoh undastand me.”
In the wake of the robbery turned murder, Deputy Commissioner of Police Chester Williams advised business owners not to resist being relieved of money and other personal items during a holdup, in order to prevent a deadly outcome.
Chester Williams
Chester Williams, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Operations)
“When it comes to preventing cases of robbery, our advice would be, if anybody comes and wants to rob you, surrender what it is that you have, don’t resist unless you believe you’ll be able to have the upper hand and the situation is even worse when you see the culprit may have a firearm, give them whatever property they ask for and then let us investigate and see if we can find those persons afterwards.”
Four weeks later and despite all that has happened since that tragic afternoon, Belize City police diligently investigated the matter. They finally caught up with an individual whom they believe was the triggerman who somehow managed to flee the scene of the incident during an exchange of gunfire with responding officers. His arraignment today is the beginning of a lengthy legal process, one which Rosado’s widow is totally wary of.
Elena Rosado
“I think da di system haftu get to dehn bwai ya, because yoh sih dehn hold dehn, dehn go and dehn come out back free. Dehn come out again fi cohn kill somebody, yoh undastand me, and somebody innocent.”
Eighteen-year-old Brandon Hughes is a resident of Aloe Vera Street in the St. Martin’s neighborhood. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.
