Father facing kidnapping charges for taking son to US

Evan Kerr

A father is in the Belize Central Prison today facing kidnapping charges.  Evan Kerr, who is currently visiting Belize from the U.S., is accused of taking his six-year-old son to the United States in November 2020 without the permission of the child’s mother.  Magistrate Tricia Pitts-Anderson denied Kerr bail and that’s where things got complicated. His attorney, Richard “Dickie” Bradley told New 5 that Kerr had already made plans to return to the U.S. when the charge was filed against him. 

Richard “Dickie” Bradley, Attorney for Evan Kerr

Richard "Dickie" Bradley

“My understanding is that from the police information the magistrate would not have known that he is a Belizean American, That he has lived here most of his life, he worked at the immigration department. But now like so many of us he is trying to make it elsewhere. SO the charge of Kidnapping is very serious charge, it is an indictable matter; it can only be tried in the Supreme Court in front of a jury. In the interim, because it is an indictable matter, you know the list of indictable matter is long that if I stretch out my two hands. So I imagine a judge will be favorable in the matter. Foreigners have been granted bail for serious offenses. It is a serious offense, the magistrate will be within her duty to look at it as the serious nature it is. So we are hoping that we could at least get bail for him so he can return to his employment in the United States and come for whatever date the courts will set noh.”

Bradley is trying to get a Supreme Court judge to hear a bail application as soon as is possible on Kerr’s behalf with strict conditions while he waits for the case to be called.  Bradley says it is his understanding that the child speaks with his mother in Belize often.  Magistrate Pitts-Anderson adjourned the case until May nineteenth.