Sandhill stabber caught in Belmopan
The hunt has ended for the man who stabbed a woman in Sandhill and then abducted a boy at knifepoint to effect his escape. Details are sketchy, but seventeen year old Leon Anthony Walford was captured by police around 4:30 this afternoon at the bus station in Belmopan. He was on the loose since early Thursday morning when he began his assault at the grounds of a religious retreat in Sandhill. According to friends of those involved, the attack on thirty-one year old Sharon Arthurs was a classic case of spurned love–not for Sharon, but for her cousin, twenty-five year old Natalie Arthurs. Natalie and the young Walford were allegedly lovers, and when Natalie informed Walford that her regular boyfriend would soon be returning from studies abroad, he became violent. She ran to a building on the retreat grounds where Sharon was sleeping. A few minutes later Walford, who had accompanied Natalie to the retreat since Monday under the guise of being her cousin, entered the building, and not finding Natalie, attacked Sharon instead. Natalie, who had escaped through a bathroom window, ran to the male dormitory and returned with a number of men. They surrounded Walford and attempted to subdue him, but Walford grabbed a fourteen year old boy, a student of Stella Maris school who lives at the Child Care Centre, and kept the crowd at bay by threatening to kill him. The two then made their way into the nearby bush before emerging on the Northern Highway. There, Walford flagged down a passing vehicle, coincidentally driven by an acquaintance. Walford apparently told the driver that he had just rescued the boy from an angry crowd. The two were dropped off in Belize City where Walford released the boy, who was found wandering in the vicinity of Mahogany and Oleander Streets around ten Thursday morning. The abducted youth, who sustained cut wounds to the arms, has returned home to the Child Care Centre where he is reportedly still suffering from the trauma of his ordeal. Sharon Arthurs remains in stable condition at the K.H.M.H.
