An Elder Labourer from Benque Border Area Killed in RTA

The Christmas season in Belize is regularly marked by traffic mishaps and this year has been no exception. Since Friday, no less than seven road traffic accidents have been reported countrywide, with four fatalities recorded. Five of those accidents spanned nearly the entire length of the George Price Highway, from just outside of Western Paradise to deep in the West. The first took place in a quiet corner of the country, on the road to the western border just outside of Benque Viejo Town. An elderly man was on his way home from the town center when he became collateral damage in a near-collision alleged to have been caused by a routine decision in the dusk. News Five’s Aaron Humes reports.

Aaron Humes, Reporting

The family home of fifty-nine-year-old Alberto Antonio Maas, located in the New Border Area, is adorned with a black bow in the memory of the family patriarch, taken away just hours before Christmas. Down the road at his job site at the Western Border, things were still hustling and bustling but there was a sense of melancholy in the air. While no one was prepared to come on camera to offer a public explanation, the taxi driver involved in the accident, sixty-seven-year-old Santos Chiquil, a resident, did tell us his version of what happened. Around six-forty-five in the evening, he was driving into town from the Western Border with a male and female passenger, when he encountered another vehicle approaching from the opposite direction with its high beam on. The lights blurred his vision, he said, and he swerved to the extreme right. But he didn’t see Maas walking on the side of the road, headed home. The collision caused fatal injuries to Maas, but neither Chiquil, who was detained through Christmas morning, nor his passengers were injured. Chiquil indicated that he had been served with a notice of intended prosecution as part of the police’s investigations. Meanwhile, Maas’ family would only tell us that he did not deserve to have this happen to him and that after today’s post-mortem examination in Belmopan, they want to lay him to rest and mourn the tragic loss of his life. Aaron Humes reporting for News Five.