Tourist acquitted of charges he assaulted a cop
Remember Woodrow Gabourel? He is the sixty-one year whose visit to Belize turned nightmarish. On March twenty-second, we shared with you Gabourel’s unfortunate run-in with the law when he was charged with assaulting police officer, Constable Mark Martinez, resisting lawful arrest and loitering in a public place. After a full day of trial, Gabourel was acquitted by Magistrate Kathleen. In her ruling,the magistrate referred to loitering according to the law, and found that in her view, there was no evidence that Gabourel was loitering. Several witensses testified in the case. They include, Sgt. Diane Brown, the female cop who Gabourel claim had slammed the police vehicle door on his right arm and PC Mark Martinez, the police officer who claimed Gabourel harmed him.
Brown testified that along with PC Martinez, the driver of the police vehicle, they were conducting a mobile patrol near Yarborough Bridge, when they saw a group of persons on the bridge. She claimed PC Martinez told them to get off the bridge. The women and children did, but Gabourel did not, instead he slapped Martinez and was then arrested. Martinez corroborated what Brown had said and added that Gabourel used obscene language and had pulled out a knife at him. In his defense, Gabourel said he was innocent and that instead he was the victim of the police. Boat captain Norris Meighan backed up Gabourel and said he witnessed the cops roughing up Gabourel. After the verdict, Gabourel was relieved and said he was looking forward to going back to his home and to getting medical attention for his injuries.
shame on the brutality of this officers of attacking a tourist. what the media should do is post thier pics so we can see who the hell they are. wish they kill each other again. they maybe wanted a little bride to have cash for the easter and didn’t get so they make this case, now they look like fools, lack of professioanlism in law inforcement.
The police think we are all fools, right?
No tourists in Belize would ever react to the police, or even if it was the actual statement made by those crooked cops.
The police department comes with a history of violence and now not even the tourists are safe in Belize.
He should sue those bastards..
Good job Ms Magistrate!
The cops need to focus on things like bank robberies and murders. Who charges someone for loitering when there are murders happening all around us? Come on PC Martinez. Employ your eforts to fight real crime!
What will the police department do with this police officers involved in the allegation???
Will they continue working as normal??? I hope the media goes back to the Police Station to report what happen on this kind of cases. We will be able to see if the Police department tolerate this stupidness or they fire corrupted police officers..
I gurantee this criminal is going to get off.How do you approve someone’s leave after comitting such a heinious act.Come on Belize.
This could put a damper on Belizeans coming home for vacation. The police should have a “profile” of the typical criminal by now. An older gentleman with grey hair is not….
We (just as the migistrate) are getting 2 stories . which is true? we don,t know.! One thing for sure is that chasing women ,men, & kid,s off a public road bridge dosen,t sound like (loiterring ?) a big deal crime to us. More concern should be on thieves & murderers,monitoring them and keeping them at bay(prevention is better than cure).And compol JEF, i know you are trying to do a good job, GET SOME PUBLIC RELATION COURSES INTO THE TRAINING SCHOOL SIR.TOURISM IS GOLD , LET,S CHERISH IT.
I was on that boat that day. The truth really is somewhere in between. Yes the police did start the problem by trying to push us off the bridge even though we where securing the boat. We were all drunk! and he did slap the officer, but the officer had no business removing us from the bridge. As far as being tourist…. We all hung out at the Yarborough and that just is not a tourist hang out.