Diego Witz, 48, a businessman of #10 King Street, Punta Gorda Town, was freed from a charge of drug trafficking when the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) sent directives for the removal of the charge, because the drug test done on the suspected cocaine concluded that it was not cocaine (we were not told what it was).
Witz’s attorney, Richard “Dickie” Bradley, is currently working on scheduling a meeting with the parole board. Witz, due to his incarceration on the drug trafficking charge, had inadvertently violated his parole on a conviction from a Mexican court, after which he was sent back to Belize.
The drug bust took place on Wednesday, May 19, 2010, between 1:30 p.m.-2:30 p.m., when undercover police officers responded to a tip they had received.
According to the police, their unmarked, undercover vehicle was pursuing a red car that had a Dangriga license plate. There were 3 persons inside the car – two dark men and one Hispanic man. Police further explained that the red vehicle had gone onto the Northern Highway, and stopped at the Texaco Gas Station, located at Mile 1½.
This is when the police note that Witz had exited the red vehicle with a red knapsack on his back and entered a white 2-door Ford car, license plate #CZL-C-15706. A marked police vehicle was called in to follow the red car, which ended up in a traffic accident between the police truck and a Land Rover Discovery, on the corner of Partridge Street and Vernon Street; the red car managed to escape.
The white car, driven at the time by Witz, was intercepted as it continued up the Northern Highway around Mile 4. Police searched the car and the red knapsack, which was inside the car along with Witz, and found five brown parcels which were suspected to be cocaine, with the marking “BOSS” on it.
The parcels were weighed and it amounted to 4,316 grams; Witz was arraigned in Senior Magistrate Sharon Frazer’s court on May 21, 2010, on the charge of drug trafficking.
However, since the parcels turned out not to be cocaine, Bradley told Amandala his client is now in violation of a parole which is totally unfair.
Witz, while free from the drug trafficking charge, was taken back to the Belize Central Prison due to his parole violation.