Echevarria Finally Arraigned for Murder

Following the directive of Director of Public Prosecutions on Wednesday, this afternoon Belmopan Police charged eighteen year old Wilser Echevarria for the crime of murder. Echevarria was on remand at the Belize Central Prison while the D.P.P. reviewed the file. According to the Criminal Code, where the suspect claims self-defence in any murder, Police cannot lay charges until the D.P.P. has issued a written directive to do so. The body of Panamanian diplomat Jose Rodrigo de la Rosa Stanford was discovered in a remote location outside of Belmopan on Sunday, November twenty-third. Echevarria was picked up on Monday and confessed to the crime. But the story took a disturbing twist when the teen allegedly told Police that the diplomat had tried to rape him, and he was only defending himself. That statement derailed attempts to arraign him for murder, until this afternoon when he was escorted to Belmopan Magistrate’s Court and was formally arraigned. Echevarria was remanded for the murder, and is to reappear in Court on January twenty-seventh, 2015.