Delbert Alvarez is Executed on Cumberbatch Street
Delbert Alvarez
There was a murder in the city before nine o’clock on Tuesday night. Delbert Alvarez was shot and killed on Cumberbatch Street, not far from his house. The victim’s family says that he had gone to buy weed when he was shot on the veranda of a house. There are tensions in certain neighbourhoods in the city in the aftermath of a string of recent murders and it is not known if Alvarez fell victim to the hostilities. News Five’s Duane Moody reports.
Duane Moody, Reporting
Around 8:45 p.m. on January twenty-eighth, shots rang out off Cumberbatch Street off Lacroix Boulevard in the Lake Independence area of Belize City and another man laid dead. Delbert Alvarez lived with his girlfriend a few blocks away from where he was murdered; he left home minutes before and headed to buy weed from a nearby peddler. There is where he was ambushed and killed.
Lunette Garnett, Sister of Deceased
“As I could reach home, I hear gunshot, but I noh think dah my lee breda cause he noh stray dah night. I cut off the phone; I put the phone pan silent. Bout after ten my ma come and tell me—before I even open the door—she tell me Lunette dehn just shot up Delbert and Delbert dead. I bawl out and I tell ahn no, not my lee breda. No. [Crying]”
The family rushed to the morgue at the K.H.M.H. and it wasn’t until hours later, they were able to identify Alvarez’s body. His sister, Lunette Garnett says that the police have not informed them of what really happened, so she went looking for answers earlier today. She ended up at a house on Cumberbatch Street, several blocks away from where she lives. It’s on the veranda that Alvarez laid mortally wounded. Overwhelmed with emotions, Garnett says her brother cried out for their mother.
Lunette Garnett
Lunette Garnett
“This morning, I try pick up the pieces. I tell my common-law let’s go make I find out dah weh part Delbert get shot, why Delbert get shot. I ask couple people, but dehn say dehn noh know; but people wouldn’t even talk. I gone around by an area weh he know and I ask wah young man, you noh know weh part di young man get shot; dah my lee bredda. Ih say dah right over deh. Ih say dehn chance ahn cause ih come buy weed. And the last word ih halla dah ma and dehn shot up ahn ina ih stomach.”
Garnett says that her brother had run-ins with the law for petty crimes, but that Alvarez was not a killer. She believes that he was killed because of tensions in the area in the wake of the murder of Ronald Michael on Ordonez Street one day earlier.
Lunette Garnett
“Dehn shouldn’t a mi do my bredda that. Yes my breda got run-ins with the police, but he noh kill nobody. He noh kill nobody. Dehn put wah hole ina fi we heart. Dehn noh know weh dehn do to we. We noh even have no money fi bury my lee breda. Dehn noh know. My lee bredda only twenty-four; he noh even start live life yet. Weh he could do soh to anybody? Weh he do soh to unu? Bruk ih foot if ih do unu something, bruk ih hand dehn, but noh kill ahn. Dehn kill ahn like ih dah nobody and then dehn left ahn down dehn. My bredda dah noh from that area; he dah from a different area. He just gone buy; strange person, aarlight strange person wah get it. One fi one. But dehn shouldn’t mi do that. Dehn shoulda mi think before dehn do it cause just like how dehn di hurt and still di hurt, we di hurt more.”
Was Alvarez a victim of ongoing gang rivalry in the city or was he simply at the wrong place at the wrong time? He didn’t have any children and was only one of two siblings. Garnett says that at this time the family cannot help, but reflect on how his life was so callously taken and the difficult task of informing his only nephew that he is dead.
Delbert Alvarez
Lunette Garnett
“When we does grow up, Delbert goh work. If Delbert make five dollars, Delbert give my ma three and he keep two. Yo want yo eyebrow do, Delbert do it. Delbert does bad pan barbering. That dah Delbert. Delbert always di smile; yo talk to Delbert, Biggs slow down, Biggs go find a job. He gah wah smile pan ih face. The smile weh I always remember; the smile wah hold wi up Duane. Ih hurt; this morning I couldn’t even sleep because I could recall Friday I see my bredda ina wah blue DR and wah stocking on ih head. That and when I gone look fi ahn at the morgue about after twelve this morning cause dah then I get fi see ahn. How my bredda deh; that dah di two memories playing ina my mind and none ahn dende noh good Duane. My baby have one uncle; no auntie. How he wah remember that; he only eight.”
Duane Moody for News Five.
