Search continues for family missing at sea
A lighthouse keeper, his wife and their children disappeared on their way to English Caye over a week ago. Their boat has been found but there is still no sign of the family. Today News Five spoke with relatives about this strange case and their refusal to give up the search.
On Wednesday December sixteenth Charles Garbutt, accompanied by his wife Kimberly, and their three children, six year old Margaret, three year old Charles junior and two year old Stephanie, loaded their twenty-three foot Mexican skiff with groceries and Christmas supplies and headed out from the city to English Caye. It was a trip they often made, but this time, something happened to them along the twelve-mile journey. Although it is speculated that the boat may have capsized and everyone on board drowned, the Garbutt family, who has been searching the waters from morning ’til dusk, every day since then, say they just can’t understand how their brother, an experienced seaman for the past twenty-five years, could have lost control of his vessel in waters the Weather Bureau is saying were moderate that day.
Dennis Garbutt, Brother
“The thing that puzzle me is that Charlie is a fisherman; Charlie used to dive; Charlie could swim. If Charlie sink, Charlie would have gone to a caye or something like that. I no understand how Charlie could sink and nobody no see and Charlie, who is careful with his family. You know, Charlie no run risks with his family, that the whole thing and not even a body, nothing come up. Just the boat, that have we the wonder.”
Thomas Lester Garbutt, Father
“Charles nearly born in the sea. That’s the boy I had around me more than ever.”
Q: “You all do not believe that probably he may have encountered problems out there and the boat capsized?”
Thomas Lester Garbutt
“I no see how sweetheart. Charles is a seaman, so I couldn’t see how that could have happen.”
Jimmy Westby, Cousin
“Well, we left Placencia yesterday. We come up all around the cayes, look about and we still no see nothing. We reach English Caye, almost dark and nothing up to now. We just looking to go back out again to look some more, but….(cries)
The police were first informed about the incident on Tuesday December twenty-second, when the Belize Maritime Wing brought in three persons who had in their possession the ill fated vessel and its fifty-five horse power outboard Yamaha engine. Today Emil Franklin, Geoffrey Zuniga and Janet Vasquez were arrested and charged for the crimes of theft and handling stolen goods. All three appeared in Magistrate’s Court and are presently out on bail.
A.I.P. Simeon Alvarez, Head of C.I.B.
“They said that they found this skiff on the sixteenth. Coincidentally, this family departed from Belize City on the sixteenth and this skiff was found couple hours after by these persons, Franklin and his crew, very amazing. And as a matter of fact, since the sixteenth they found this skiff capsized, I think their interest should have been to report this incident to the police but in fact no, they took this engine and placed it on theirs and they took possession of the boat.”
As the Garbutt family were looking to depart on yet another search from the back of the Belize Maritime Wing this morning, they bumped into Franklin, who was trying to get his vessel released –which still had the Garbutt’s engine attached. Franklin tried to convince the family he had nothing to do with the disappearance.
Emil Franklin
“I am trying to prove my point to you about what happen. I have my own boat which is better than his boat, if you want to compare boats.”
Franklin, who is a fisherman from Bluefield Range says all he and his crew are guilty of is taking the boat and engine. Franklin says he believes Garbutt’s boat capsized after the captain lost control due to bad weather.
Emil Franklin
“We coming from Bluefield range. It’s been very choppy for the past, I would say, we came in Wednesday so Tuesday, Monday and Sunday it was very rough. Anybody that really have dealt with the sea they know more or less how the weather was, so it was extremely rough, choppy, little breezy right. We coming in, I was coming and I saw like two orange containers floating right, I never really bother to interfere or stop cause it was not that noticeable to go out of my way as rough as it is to try and stop to look at that. I stop because I saw a little while after, I continue in my boat, I see like an object sticking out of the water facing up.”
Franklin says as they continued towards the object, they noticed that it was a boat.
Emil Franklin
“Exactly, got the boat floating that you can see that a machine was at the back of the boat. We had to rise the boat out of the water; we couldn’t keep it float so we had to keep moving my boat and keep holding the rope cause if we let the rope go it would sink down because water was still in the boat, plenty water. We didn’t see anything else float up out of the water where we hauled it out, just water. No groceries no items, nothing at all.”
But the family contends there is no way the boat turned over.
Dennis Garbutt
“Not from my experience. We, that is one of the safest boats around; that is the boat that me and my dad always use. And with the size engine that Charlie had I don’t see how it could have happened. At the same time we don’t know how rough the sea was that day.”
Thomas Garbutt, Brother
“It’s really rough. I just think he didn’t go anywhere. I don’t believe he drowned. I think something else happened. Certain things need to question.”
According to Alvarez the police, Port Authority and B.D.F. Maritime Wing will continue with the search and will not stop until the case is solved.
Charles Garbutt has been an employee of the Port Authority for the last nine years. Assistant Inspector Simeon Alvarez says that the police are looking for another person whom they believe can assist them in their investigation of this incident.
