Caye Caulker resident claims police brutality

Still on crime, last week Friday News Five reported on a brutality case in which the victim Ronlee Petillo, who is no stranger to the police, claimed that two Belize City based police officers took him on the highway and in addition to beating him at a desolate location, one of them fired shots near his head. The peaceful island of Caye Caulker also has a case which the victim is claiming brutality. The forty-six year old man says he got into a minor scuffle with a friend at the Ocean Front Bar. Even though the incident was over, the bar owner called the police. Things took a turn for the worse when the officer decided to take him to the police station.

Mandingo Mejia, Claims Police Brutality
“Two ah we mi di fight. How you wah ker one man? So ih still have to go dah station. So when ih ker me dah station, walking; ih noh handcuff me nor nothing. So ih give me to the authorities dat was in di station on duty. So when I get inna di station he just grab me by my shirt and like let’s go inna di cell and I dah like why? Just let go my shirt I could walk by myself and not to drag me. Ih punch me and di next two jump pan me and like start—I land pan di ground and dehn start to wap me up inna di station; burst mi head, I di spit blood, dislocate mi thumb, dehn wap me inna my back and thing and lock me up from di Friday, Saturday, Sunday dehn took me out without no charge sheet. Dat no right because if I would have done something wrong dehn would have charged me and take me to court, which in they are not doing that.”

Jose Sanchez
“Have you made a report to internal affairs?”

Mandingo Mejia
“No, not yet because I don’t really know the procedure of doing that because I haven’t had to deal with police like that before.”

Jose Sanchez
“And the injuries you have?”

Mandingo Mejia
“Di injuries I got; I talked to the corporal and I told the corporal that I feel one of my ribs is broken and my thumb is dislocated. He told me how do I know that like I am a doctor.”

Jose Sanchez
“Did you go to the doctor? What did the doctor say?”

Mandingo Mejia
“Well, the doctor told me that I was to do an x-ray today but the x-ray machine isn’t working. So they gave me a further date to come back the eighteenth of this month.”

Mejia said he had to return to Caye Caulker and was unsure of the procedures of filing a complaint against the officers he claimed had beat him without cause.