After several weeks of litigation in the Supreme Court to settle outstanding arrears of some three hundred thousand dollars owed to Belize Waste Control, Mayor Darrell Bradley can rest easy tonight since the matter is now behind the Belize City Council. Both parties had been locked in a legal battle that led to a war […]
A United Nations report places Belize as the third of ten countries with the highest rate of murders in the world. It’s a startling statistic and this past weekend proved to be one of the bloodiest since the beginning of the year. In the wave of violence five persons were killed. We start here […]
The second murder took place hours later on Saturday night. Fifty-seven year old Alfonso Cruz of Rhaburn’s Alley, Belize City was shot to the left side of the chest and left lower back. While a motive has not been determined, it is known Cruz was hanging out in his own yard at Rhaburn’s Alley, when […]
Twenty-four later on the south side, eighteen year old Kevin Rodriguez was gunned down and his family believes he was lured to his death. Just before eleven p.m., Rodriguez, received a phone call and stepped outside a house on Curl Thompson Street. Within minutes, he was shot three times by a gunman. Rodriguez laid dead […]
The weekend’s violence started on Friday night up north in the village of Carmelita when a fifty-year old grocer from Guinea Grass and his son visited their family farm located three miles off the highway in the village. They discovered that two homes on the property had been completely ransacked and all their personal possessions […]
In just a matter of seconds on Friday, Edison Johnson’s life was changed for all time. He is now an inmate at the Belize Central Prison, charged with two counts of murder. Orange Walk Police say those charges were levied on the advice of the D.P.P.’s office, so it seems improbable at this time […]
Where murders are concerned, Belize recorded fewer numbers in 2013 that in the five years prior. That was good news for a country under siege, and provided hope that perhaps it signalled a trend. 2014 isn’t looking as good, with five murders just this past weekend. For context, you can look at a new study […]
Aside from the five persons who were murdered, two others died in traffic fatalities. There was a fatal traffic accident on Saturday night near mile nineteen and a half on the Phillip Goldson Highway, involving a commuter bus and a cyclist, was the last of three deadly collisions over the weekend. Shortly after eight p.m. […]
Tensions are reaching a feverish pitch tonight between Sarstoon Temash Institute for Indigenous Management, U.S. Capital Energy and government. On April third, Justice Michelle Arana handed down a major decision in favor of SATIIM as well as five Mayan communities bordering the Sarstoon-Temash National Park, in a suit brought against the Government of Belize and […]
The Mayan Leaders in the buffer communities held an emergency meeting this afternoon in light of Cabinet’s decision. The spokesman for the Mayan leaders is SATIIM’s Executive Director Greg Ch’oc. Having now confirmed that approval has been given to extend the permit of US Capital Energy, Ch’oc says that aside from taking legal recourse, the […]
While five fishermen are home safe, a trio of pirates is in custody tonight. As we reported on Thursday night, the Belize Coast Guard responded to a robbery twenty miles southeast of Belize City where pirates held up the fisher folks at gunpoint and confiscated their produce. There was a shootout initiated by the pirates […]
There has been precious little coming out of the Immigration Department where the Penner situation is concerned. At this point…and really at every point since the scandal broke, there have been only vague assurances that some seemingly perpetual investigation or the other is still underway. But Penner and immigration corruption aside, Minister of Immigration Godwin […]
Minister Hulse’s call to a talk show on Wednesday morning was in response to a previous Belizean caller who was upset at the turn-around and endless hassles to get a passport. His comments didn’t go unnoticed, and News Five has received a copy of a letter sent to Director Maria Marin by a very senior […]
There was a big bust at the P.G.I.A. on Thursday when a Avianca flight touched down from El Salvador. On board were two Cuban twin brothers with fraudulent Guatemalan passports and a Nigerian who had a fake Belize visa. Joel Gonzalez, in his fraudulent Guatemalan passport went by the name of Nestor Bayona Carreno, while […]
If all has gone as scheduled the Forest Department, working along with the Police, should be conducting a sweep of South Stann Creek. The goal is to crack down on illegal harvesting of rosewood which has increased in the dry season. But that increase in activity isn’t limited to the Stann Creek District. In the […]
A News Five team is just back from the headquarters of the Belize Coast Guard where three men have been detained following a shootout at sea. We’ll have that coming up, but first…there is some closure for the family of Carlos Michael Diaz tonight. There is also relief for residents of the Lord’s Bank area […]
This story just in…a high speed chase in Belizean waters involving the Belize Coast Guard took place this evening. Our News Five team is just back and reports that three pirates were detained following a shootout at sea. According to Operations Officer, Lieutenant Greg Soberanis, the trio attempted to rob a boat about twenty miles […]
While the political gods continue to throw a shroud of protection around former Minister of State Elvin Penner, the fates seem to be conspiring against him. Today, leave for judicial review was granted by Justice Courtney Abel in the recall petition of Penner. It’s only the first step, but it is a significant one. The […]
Justice delayed is justice denied… This afternoon, the B.T.L. Employees Trust issued a statement in respect of a long pending judgment on the constitutionality of the second nationalization of Telemedia which was argued back in October 2012. The first nationalization case was heard in 2011 when the court declared the nationalization to be unconstitutional, but […]
The People’s United Party held a press conference at Independence Hall this afternoon. The topics up for discussion ranged from Elvin Penner to very internal politics. We’ll have all that for you, starting with a demand by P.U.P. Leader Francis Fonseca for Anwar Barrow’s appointment to be rescinded. Anwar Barrow, son of Prime Minister Dean […]
Another topic on the political table this afternoon was the now very well known Mytheon Solutions. That company was first registered by John Saldivar and Khalid Belisle in 2009. John Saldivar became sole owner in 2010, and promptly put the company in his wife’s name. It wasn’t exactly impressive sleight of hand, because the paper […]
The Caribbean Court of Justice today issued a decision in the case of Doctor Raju Meenavalli versus Janae Matute and her mother, Georgia. The decision was delivered from Port of Spain via teleconference. The CCJ upheld a decision by the Court of Appeal that Doctor Meenavalli failed to act in accordance with professional standards causing […]
On Tuesday evening, a transgender woman was badly beaten in Belize City. She goes by the name of Vanessa Champagne Paris and was walking on Vernon Street when she was first targeted. Dressed in women’s clothing, Vanessa’s attackers followed her and by the time she got to Mayflower Street, the group morphed into an angry […]
Band Fest 2014 has been moved to the Santiago Ricalde Stadium in Corozal Town. The decision was made on Monday, less than a week before the event. The original venue was to have been the People’s Stadium in Orange Walk Town, but organizers say the field was not ready. It’s a decision which has caused […]
The top executives of the Norwegian Cruise Lines were in the Jewel today and invited the media to a tour of one of its two ships that called on port. It was sort of a PR Tour organized through the Belize Tourism Board and we’ll have that later in the newscast. But first, time is […]
