Roy Lord is Gunned Down on Wilson Street

Roy Lord

There was a late night shooting in Belize City on Monday which claimed the life of a young man from Lord’s Bank Village.  Police are yet to determine whether the murder of Roy Lord is tied to gang activity.  What they have been able to confirm is that he was accosted by a lone gunman who fired on the unsuspecting pedestrian with lethal accuracy.  The incident happened shortly before midnight on Wilson Street, in the vicinity of Ephesus SDA Primary School.  News Five’s Isani Cayetano Reports.

Isani Cayetano, Reporting

Thirty-one-year-old Roy Lord was rounding the bend on Wilson Street from its intersection with Cinderella Plaza when he was met with a deadly shower of bullets.  The fatal shooting of the Lord’s Bank resident occurred shortly before midnight when neighbors say they heard a barrage of shots in their vicinity.  Lord was walking in the direction of Sandlighter’s Promenade when he was accosted by an unknown individual.  It appears as though he may have been listening to music through a pair of earphones when he was attacked.

Voice of: First Responder

“It was about around 11:50, minutes to twelve, we were laying in bed between sleep and wake and I heard the bang, the noise, about five bangs and I immediately realized that it was more or less gunshots.  It was gunshots.  So I took about thirty seconds to a minute and then I got up and took a look through my window and I didn’t see anything.  Then I came out on my verandah by the door and looked up the street.  I could see a body on the ground.”

Mortally injured, Roy Lord had fallen to the pavement where he bled out from gunshot wounds to various parts of the body.

Voice of: First Responder

“I waited a little while, thinking that the police checkpoint from the next street which is Kelly Street, would have responded to the noise and see what was happening.  After about three to four minutes, I realized that they didn’t come around so I came downstairs on the street and I looked up the street and got a better view that it was actually somebody on the ground.  So what ran through my head at the time is that it was definitely gunshot!  So I proceeded to walk up the street and at the same time trying to call 911, just to get some help for the person laying on the ground.”

According to a first responder, whose identity we will not reveal, the victim had what appeared to be injuries to the head and upper body.

Voice of: First Responder

“I could see two in his torso area and definitely at least one, maybe two, in his head.”

We warn you that the following image is graphic in nature.  Laying on the ground, Lord makes an attempt to get up, but collapses once again into a prostrate position.  Immediately he is surrounded by responding officers who carry him and place him into the pan of the police mobile.

Voice of: First Responder

“He was still alive at that time.  He was still trying to get up, I believe, and I was just trying to tell him to stay there that I had called for help, just stay still and try not to move, but I don’t know if he was recognizing what I was trying to say to him, as he was unresponsive and still trying to get up.  At that time, about  two minutes or so later on, a taxi was coming around the corner so I stopped the taxi as to try to have them not run over the guy, you know, it was kind of dark on the corner and people don’t know what’s going on at the time.”

That cabdriver then rushed over to nearby Kelly Street to inform officers at that checkpoint that someone had been shot just one block over.

Voice of: First Responder

“That’s when the police responded and came out and started to process the scene and tried to contain the crowd.  And they also called for ambulance and stuff, the ambulance was taking a little while so they tried to assist the gentleman as he was still trying to get up, I won’t say conscious but they tried to put him in the back of the police vehicle and take him to the hospital.”

Regrettably, Lord wouldn’t survive the incident.  He succumbed to his injuries shortly thereafter while undergoing treatment.  It is unclear what led to the deadly attack on the laborer, as police are still investigating. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.