Three murders mar holiday weekend

The time of death is not certain, but for administrative purposes we’ll call it the first murder of 2007. Early Monday morning police discovered the body of a Salvadoran national lying on the side of the Western Highway and strongly suspect foul play. Around seven-thirty a.m., the body of fifty-one year old Jose Luis Torres was found on the side of the road near mile forty-three, just two miles away from his daughter’s home where he had eaten supper around seven-thirty Sunday night and was last seen alive. Police suspect murder due to the nature of the injuries on Torres’s body. They are asking anyone with information on the death to please call the nearest police station.

On New Year’s Eve police discovered the lifeless body of another immigrant lying on a roadside and have since detained a suspect. Around ten on Sunday night, twenty-five year old Guatemalan, Edwin Anibal Hernandez, was found in the vicinity of Maya King Village on the side of the Southern Highway near the Placencia Road junction. Authorities report that Hernandez had been drinking with another Hispanic man when the two became embroiled in an argument that led to a fight. Investigations have led police to detain a twenty-nine year old Honduran.

Alcohol appears to have been the enabler of another year end homicide, this time in the nation’s capital. Around twelve fifteen a.m. on December thirty-first, police found twenty-four year old Jose Hidalgo bleeding heavily from injuries to his head. He later died at Western Regional Hospital. Authorities report that Hidalgo was drinking with a group of men at a bar located in the Salvapan community of Belmopan when a fight broke out between Hidalgo and Salvadoran Jose Carbajal. That fight ended when Carbajal beat Hidalgo with a piece of board. Carbajal has been arrested and charged with murder. The killings of Jose Hidalgo and Edwin Hernandez have brought the murder count for 2006 to eighty-seven according to our unofficial statistics.