3 Minors Raped in 72 Hours

Tanya Santos

We start off tonight’s newscast with the terrible news of sexual assaults upon three minors in Belize City, San Pedro Town and Belmopan. They are all separate incidents which occurred over the last seventy-two hours reported to the Belize Police Department. In two of the incidents, the alleged perpetrators have been detained by police pending charges of rape. On August twenty-first in Belize City, a twelve-year-old boy went to a house in Belama Phase Four for tutoring, but was attacked and forcibly sodomized by the tutor. Meanwhile, in the second instance, also on Saturday, a twelve-year-old girl reported she was at a home in San Pedro Town when a twenty-year-old man followed her into the bathroom and raped her. In the third case, which occurred in Belmopan on Monday, the police department has issued a wanted poster for Nigel Gonzalez who is originally from Corozal. News Five spoke to C.E.O. in the Ministry responsible for Families about this terrible spate of sexual exploitation of children.

Tanya Santos, C.E.O., Ministry of Families

“Let me out-rightly condemn this type of behaviour; it is actually criminal and is taking advantage of our most vulnerable citizens of our country. And even more so because it is usually from people who children trust; they are placed in a position of trust and they abuse this trust. So we out-rightly condemn that and it is unacceptable and we have to do more to protect our children.”