Belize Police Department’s Communications Director, Fitzroy Yearwood, Passes Away

Fitzroy Yearwood

The Belize Police Department has lost a well-known colleague and so has the local media. Assistant Superintendent Fitzroy Yearwood passed away this afternoon following a massive stroke that he suffered over the Easter weekend.  The communications director, who had been serving in that capacity for the past three years, built a solid rapport with reporters, as he was also a familiar face on the television. This morning, when we spoke with Commissioner of Police Chester Williams, he admitted that Yearwood’s prognosis did not look good, but that they were awaiting the results of CT scan that had been scheduled for later today.  Sometime around three p.m., we received word that ASP Yearwood had passed away at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital where, we are told, that he had been admitted to the Intensive Care Unit. Here’s what ComPol Williams shared earlier today, prior to the devastating news.

Chester Williams

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“Mr. Yearwood has been the face of the police department for the past three years, interacting with the media and doing the weekly press briefs, as well as doing other public relations matters as may be directed myself or OCED for him to do.  So in a time like this where he is in the hospital fighting for his life, we want to ask the nation to please join us in prayers for him and his family and we do hope that the good Lord is going to see him through and that he will be able to return to actual duties in due course.  I know that he loves what he does as a press officer.  He normally does it with a very high degree of pride and passion and so, for him to be out at this time, it saddens us and we just want to hope for the best going forward.  In terms of his prognosis, the hospital is supposed to do a CT scan today and we are anxiously awaiting the result of that CT scan to see if it is going to yield any good results.  We’re hoping that that would be the case, that it will yield good results in terms of his prognosis, and so we just await that result, that CT scan to be done and then we’ll see how things progress from there.”

News Five extends our deepest condolences to the Yearwood family, as well as ASP Yearwood’s colleagues in the Belize Police Department.