Third suspect arraigned on murder charges

This morning twenty six year old Taedron Bennett was formally arraigned in Belize City Magistrate Court on thirteen separate counts including murder, attempted murder, dangerous harm, deadly means of harm, and conspiracy to commit murder. He appeared before Chief Magistrate Herbert Lord, who ordered that he be remanded to Hattieville Prison until June sixteenth. Lord told Bennett, “These charges are indictable … they are triable at the Supreme Court where twelve men and women will decide if you are guilty”. Bennett was represented in court today by Attorney Simeon Sampson. He is the third man to be charged in connection with the double murder of Kevin and Philip Brannon.

The media frenzy surrounding the arrest of three young men for murder this week has highlighted the fact that we are living in an extremely gun friendly society. This afternoon I sat down with Police Commissioner Gerald Westby to discuss the Brannon murders and the guns that rule our streets.

Jacqueline Godwin, Reporting
Tonight police high command are keeping their fingers crossed that the evidence used to arrest Ricardo Aguilar, Joseph Kee and Taedron Bennett in the double homicide of Kevin and Philip Brannon will be enough to secure a conviction.

Gerald Westby, Police Commissioner
?The investigation is still ongoing and certainly there will be more evidence and hopefully at the time of trial we will have some type of evidence we would want for conviction. Well like all other investigations we certainly need the support of the public and we are hoping that eventually we will be getting that evidence because we will continue to vigorously pursue. That is not to say that we do not have the evidence but we do not want to go in-depth. We want to leave that for the D.D.P.?s office and he has done a great job so I?m certain that at the end of the day we will have sufficient evidence to make sure that the matter goes before the court.?

It will be up to the prosecution to prove whether or not the three accused men committed the crime but as the police continue their investigations, there are several legal issues that Police Commissioner Gerald Westby believes gives the defence an undue advantage in any case.

Gerald Westby
?Well, the D.P.P. is looking at, right now as the law is the defence has undue advantage because he can an un-sworn statement and he can not be tested in court. Which in the prosecution witness has to be tested and so these are some of the amendments he must be able to go through the same rigor of cross examination like the prosecution witnesses. You know natural justice the people are entitled to see what evidence is before then. But I think that the prosecution ought to get any evidence that the defence would like to bare a forehand too because it is only the prosecution at this time that presents their part of the case. Then well of course that is the way it goes. It is the prosecution who is making the allegations and they have to prove it before the court. That is the way the law is so we have to live with it and work with it. But if we find anybody tampers with any of the witness then we will deal with them.?

But while the Police Department and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions fight to change the law, the sheer number of guns is also another major concern.

Gerald Westby
?But we are very strict with the issuing of a fire arm license. An applicant has to justify it. It has to be vetted before they are approved by the Commissioner. And only two persons within the department who deals with firearm license and that is myself and the deputy. So we try to make sure we try to control. It?s alarming for everybody but certainly the police has been working vigorously to try to get at the proliferation of firearm.?

The police strongly suspects a number of firearms are being smuggled across our borders.

Gerald Westby
?We have our neighbouring countries that it is easily or readily available that firearms can be handed over the borders for relatively low price. And of course, we have the United States where people to and for Belizeans and they can smuggle in firearms, so these are some of the areas I feel that firearms are coming in.?

Today the police department was unable to tell us exactly how many gun licenses have been granted. Police Commissioner Gerald Westby says their information technology unit is in the process of developing a programme where that kind of data will be stored.