Mexican Caretaker is Fatally Mauled by Thieves in Placencia
Gabriel Guzman Cruz
One person is in custody tonight following a horrific murder in Seine Bight village on Tuesday afternoon. Police are looking for a minor and have recovered some items stolen in the robbery turn murder. A caretaker, forty-six year old Gabriel Guzman Cruz, was killed in a gruesome way at the property; he was cut on the face and body and a mattress inside the property was set on fire. But the caretaker managed to get out and roll down the stairs where he was found. News Five’s Isani Cayetano was down south today and spoke one-on-one with the person who found the dying man.
Isani Cayetano, Reporting
Mexican national Gabriel Alejandro Guzman Cruz, one of three caretakers on a property near the outskirts of Placencia, met a hideous end on Tuesday afternoon when he was fatally attacked by a pair of men who savaged him inside this two-storey building. The forty-six-year-old was here at Hanna’s Paradise when he was visited by armed intruders. It wasn’t until construction workers at an adjacent site noticed smoke billowing from the second floor that they realized something was amiss.
Voice of: First Responder
“When I reached by the fence, I observed a guy rolling out of the house full of blood. He tried to get up but he was weak, rolled down the step. I went across, told him not to move and called 911. Then I came out and went to the roadside to get the police to come in to show them where the guy was.”
The groundskeeper had rolled down a flight of stairs and was observed lying motionless on the landing below. Arriving on the scene moments later were two police officers who had responded to the call. Guzman Cruz was bleeding profusely from injuries sustained during the attack.
Voice of: First Responder
“He was cut from ears to the mouth, through and through, his top jaw teeth and bottom jaw teeth completely destroyed.”
Isani Cayetano
“How were you alerted to what happened across from here? How did you become aware of something happening there?”
Voice of: First Responder
“Well one of my co-workers they went to haul some sand and they hailed me and tell me smoke di come outta di house and I neva sih di smoke, but at the same time we sih di guy di roll come out on the verandah.”
He had been hacked viciously with a machete; two large cut wounds were visible on the right side of the face. Guzman Cruz also had multiple stab wounds to the body, as well as his hands. In carrying out the ghastly assault, the perpetrators also set the room on fire by torching a mattress.
Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
“From what I have been briefed is that it might have been a case of robbery where the victim was at the home and two persons went there, I think a father and a son or two brothers, and they stole certain things from the house and inflicted machete wounds to the person who was within the home who is now the victim, or the deceased, after which the put him on a mattress and they lit the mattress on fire. He apparently was not dead and he managed to crawl out of the building before the fire took over the mattress, but I guess he used that last energy to crawl out of the building and upon getting out he succumbed to his injuries.”
Chester Williams
At the scene, police were able to recover a machete and a pair of knives believed to have been the weapons used in the deadly encounter.
Chester Williams
“We have in custody one person at this time. We have recovered some of the items stolen from the house and we are looking for a fifteen-year-old whom we also believe can assist us with that investigation.”
Reporter
“Are these persons foreigners or believed to be locals?”
Chester Williams
“Foreigners.”
Andrea Polanco
“The persons who committed the crime…”
Chester Williams
“Yes, as well as the deceased.”
On the strength of a search warrant, officers visited a residence in Seine Bight Village where a number of items believed to have been stolen from Hanna’s Paradise were found inside a room. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.
