Charges to be Brought Against Asian Businessmen

Gregory Soberanis

According to Soberanis, the men were in violation of a number of laws; including the fact that boat captain Leslie Williams was driving the boat with an expired license.  The substantive charges, he says, will likely fall under the state of emergency regulations.

Commander Gregory Soberanis, Vice Commandant, Belize Coast Guard

“They were in possession of unaccustomed goods.  They had no permit and were unable to provide any documentation to show that they were authorized to conduct such a transaction.  So in our view, they were in possession of unaccustomed goods.  Secondly, the captain’s license had expired, so they were operating with an expired captain’s license.  The captain’s license had expired from April twenty-third of this year and of course because it was, in our view, a non-essential movement, they are in violation of the current SOE.  So we see several infractions that occurred with this particular incident.”