Police: teargas/live rounds justifiable
While the police officers on the ground in Benque maintain that they made every effort to end the confrontation peacefully, exercised extreme patience and only took action when it was absolutely necessary, the department has come under fire for their response to the rioters in Benque. This morning, News 5’s Jacqueline Woods spoke with Police Press Officer G. Michael Reid, who says the officers intention was not to hurt anyone, but to maintain law and order.
Jacqueline Woods, Reporting
The peaceful demonstration was scheduled to last for two hours and should have ended at the basketball court. However, things did not go as planned as about a hundred and fifty people left the procession and stayed behind on the street. Today, Police Press Officer, G. Michael Reid, says preliminary investigations have revealed that the intention of the second crowd was to instigate trouble.
G.Michael Reid, Police Press Officer
“The police found along the way tyres that were piled up, used tyres that were eventually put on fire. Huge piles of stones that were piled up and put there for that specific purpose. Now we don’t know who may have been out there with a gun or might have been armed.”
Reid says to prevent problems, Senior Superintendent of Police, Bernard Lino read the Riot Act to the crowd. The proclamation was declared in an effort to maintain law and order.
Michael Reid
“People must understand that they stay their at risk to their own personal safety because then the security forces would have to take whatever measures are necessary to disperse the crowd. It doesn’t matter where you gather if it is in the middle of the street or in a yard somewhere, you cannot gather with the purpose to cause unrest. And we cannot allow anybody, any citizen to be hurt by people like this who have only a malicious intent at heart.”
But the group remained at the location and it did not take long before there was a standoff between the security force and the people who decided to stay. The police contend that their officers
remained calm and constantly urged the gathering to go home, but their attempts were futile. According to Reid, a group of young men started to attack the police, and in attempt to drive back the crowd the police threw teargas.
G. Michael Reid
“The people were aggressing the police, they were throwing missiles and rocks and as a matter of fact to the size where the shields that the police use were shattered. This was the force of which these rocks were coming.”
The riot squad, made up of members of the Police Dragon Unit, was deployed to the scene to try and bring the situation under control, but the squad too became under threat. Many of their shields were broken as the crowd kept throwing rocks at them.
The police say the shooting that occurred during the riot is something their officers tried to prevent from taking place, but that they had no alternative but to defend themselves. According to Reid, both Amalio Gamez, who was shot in the foot, and Marco Sanchez who was shot in his chest were stoning at the officers when they were shot by one of them.
G. Michael Reid
“These people were hurling stones and these guys were cornered, they couldn’t move and they kept coming; the people were not relenting. And the officer told me that he feels terrible about what happened, he didn’t want to hurt anybody. In fact, several shots were fired in the air to warm the people to please back off, when they didn’t. He told me that he was firing for the legs. In fact, one of the persons was hit in the leg. The other one though, he’s telling me it seems when he threw a rock he ended up in a crunch position and because of that he was hit where he was hit.”
The police say an intensive investigation into the whole affair has been launched to determine exactly what caused the incident to turn violent. Jacqueline Woods reporting for News 5.
This afternoon, Prime Minister Said Musa met with Benque’s Mayor Marconi Sosa, area representative Erwin Contreras and other officials from the town, as well as the staff of Mopan Technical High. We understand that the government press office has complied a report of the meeting, but up to newstime tonight had not released it to the media.
