Ramon Espat Jr. Executed Outside Restaurant in Orange Walk

The Espat family in Orange Walk Town is mourning the death of their loved one, following an early morning execution in that northern municipality.  Twenty-four-year-old Ramon Espat Junior was outside Spicy Bites Restaurant on Aurora Street in the vicinity of Hi-Five Night Club when a gunman brandishing two weapons approached him and opened fire. The execution took place in front of patrons gathered on the street and after the shooting the gunman escaped through a nearby park leading to the highway. Espat Junior was struck seven times to the body, including once to the head; he was rushed to the Northern Regional Hospital where he was pronounced dead. News Five’s Duane Moody headed north today to find out that the execution may have been a result of a domestic dispute.

Duane Moody, Reporting

In the wee small hours of Sunday, as residents were out socialising, they would witness a most heinous crime – the execution of twenty-four-year-old Ramon Espat Junior as he stood outside Spicy Bites. These two spots covered with soil was where he bled out after being shot multiple times at close range by a gunman.

Voice of: Resident

“No even five minutes good when the guy walked out by the car, I just hear shots started to the ring off when I mi di come back from the food place. So everybody start to run up the other side fi try get out of stray bullet way. So I breaks too and I watch and see wah short guy like di buss shot and thing with a big machine gun cross way ih chest, but dah noh that ih di use. Ih di use the handgun weh ih mi have and he start to leggo shots. And then I say dah weh di crazy this now and when we look we see the young man on the ground di fight fi ih life, di try breathe.”

Police arrived at the scene soon after and rushed him to the Northern Regional Hospital. Espat Junior would not survive the attack; he was hit as many as seven times to the body. His father mustered up the courage to speak with us.

Ramon Espat Sr.

Ramon Espat Sr., Father of Deceased

“They gave my son seven shots. One of the head, one on his private, one of the sides, two on each side. They killed my son like a dog and that cannot stay like that. They have to find that person.”

Ramon Espat Senior believes that his son is a victim of domestic violence. He says that his son was called to the location and within less than an hour he was murdered. His cell phone is missing, which the father believes contains evidence of death threats.

Ramon Espat Sr.

“They always focus on domestic violence from man to woman and always when a man have a domestic problem, they do not look into it. They always take part for the woman. But the same way how we have domestic man against woman, we have woman against man. My son went through hell for four years. Every time my son come crying home, he say he can’t take it no more. He was chased from home; he lived here with me four months and a half. Meanwhile he was living here, threats were coming in. He cried to me and said you know what threats are coming in. I don’t want to go into details, but this is a domestic problem. We told my son not to go out there because of the threats and that’s the reason I ask the police to find that phone and in the video, we have a female that picked up the phone and you could see clear that she has the phone. Police need to find that phone because they took him out from where he was and they shot him. And that phone has a lot of evidence. I am asking Mister Chester to push this; to find. I want justice. I want justice because I was holding this in. I asked my son to go to the station and show the threats, everything that he used to talk to her, but he said no. They will laugh. And I said no papa there is justice; go. And now it is late. I don’t want to accuse and say that she sent to kill him, I don’t want to say that, but in the phone, there is evidence that he was threatened. There was evidence that they called him the last minute, who called him the last minute, who take him out and who take him out from the business place.”

Espat Senior, a former police special constable, says that his son was not a troublemaker.

Ramon Espat Sr.

“People that knew my son can back me up and tell me or tell you that my son was not a troublemaker. He was a nice guy, not because he is my son, but I educate him that way. It’s hard but they took away the only thing I had.”

Duane Moody

“He was your only son, sir?”

Ramon Espat Sr.

“Yes, my only son. And that person who did it, look at me. You took about the most precious thing from me.”

Espat Junior leaves behind a four-year-old son. Duane Moody for News Five.