Police Corporal Interdicted for Allegedly Stealing from Bus Conductor

The fatal shooting of a youth in Orange Walk is not the only incident that the Belize Police Department has to deal with when it comes to its officers. A video clip went viral on Sunday that exposes a police corporal who was taken off a bus by the owner of the bus after the officer allegedly stole money from the conductor’s cash bag. The bus owner, in this case, had to be the one to hard-talk the corporal before he eventually gave in and decided to go back on the bus to take out the cash from where he had stashed it. The entire charade was captured on video, including the part where the corporal sat down in one of the bus seats to extract the money from where he had apparently hid it in his underwear. Today, Commissioner of Police, Chester Williams told reporters that the embarrassing situation is one he wished he could have dealt with from his office. 

Chester Williams

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“It’s one of the most embarrassing situation I’ve seen with police in a situation like that. I really wish that I could just write to a letter and sign it and tell the man “you are dismissed.” But unfortunately, we have a system that requires due process, and so the matter is with P.S.B. That police officer was interdicted from duty. I expect that by the end of the day the P.S.B. should be leveling charges on him internally because I’m told that the bus owners do not want any criminal action. In respect, thereof, and we will ensure that the tribunal is heard in the most expeditious manner while still providing him with his right to due process, because I wouldn’t want that we do something that he ends up appealing and have to come back. I don’t think that policeman should ever be allowed to wear the police uniform again. That is saying what I have to say in the most cautious way I possibly can. From what we know is that he alighted the bus and may have taken the cash bag of the conductor and took the money there from and hid the money in his brief, I think, I don’t know. I saw him going down and took out the money. And, uh, as you can see in the video, he was questioned over and over. He denied having the money and then eventually he acceded to having the money and, he went inside the bus and took out the money from his private parts area and returned it. That is extremely embarrassing and to make matters worse is that he wore the police uniform at that particular moment. It’s extremely embarrassing.”