BURRELL BOOM ROAD, Belize District, Tues. Jan. 9, 2018– Over the weekend there were three road traffic accidents that claimed the lives of two persons. Amandala has confirmed, however, that there was yet another fatal road traffic accident today.
According to official reports, the victim, Double Head Cabbage resident Kendall “Tait” Goff, 19, was struck and killed by a vehicle after he exited a McFadzean bus shortly after 5 a.m. today.
Goff, who was on his way to work in Burrell Boom at the time, was flung to the left side of the highway, into a yard near the Castleton Racetrack on the Burrell Boom Road.
The vehicle that knocked him down, a Mazda pickup truck, remained on the scene until police arrived. It had extensive damages to its front portion. The person behind the steering wheel at the time of the accident was Burrell Boom resident and Operations Supervisor at Belize Water Services (BWS), Christopher Vernon, 55. Police reports say that Vernon was travelling towards Burrell Boom at the time of the accident.
This afternoon he was arraigned in the Belize City Magistrate Court for the offences of manslaughter by negligence, causing death by careless conduct, and driving without due care and attention. He was released on a bail of $4,000 and his case was adjourned until April 9.
While this matter has already gone before the courts, Goff’s body remains at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital (KHMH), where it will undergo a post-mortem examination.
This morning, his father, Evan Goff, told the press that he offered his son a ride to work, but he said he would take the bus.
According to Goff, ten minutes after he arrived in Belize City, he received the news of his son’s demise.
He said that there are eyewitnesses who say that his son was knocked off the shoulder of the highway, not upon his exiting the bus. Goff believes that this accident could have been avoided.
The senior Goff said that the person who knocked down his son is a family friend, but indicated that he is known to be “a hard driver.”
Goff is now making preparations to bury his youngest child, a young man who has been described as a hard worker, faithful Christian, and an amicable person.