SAN IGNACIO, Cayo District, Thurs. Oct. 11, 2018– The murder of Bobby Garcia, 19, made headlines in the Belize media because of the strange way he was killed. Garcia’s body was found on Monday, October 8, on an altar inside a Mayan temple in “Plaza E” at Cahal Pech, and many people speculated that it was some sort of ritualistic sacrifice. It now appears these speculations may be accurate.
Garcia’s body was found by two tourists with his throat slashed and stab wounds to the abdomen. Police investigations led them to charge two teenaged minors, 14 and 15 years old, for the crimes of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. The teens were taken to the San Ignacio Magistrate’s Court, where they were remanded to the Wagner Youth Facility, at the Kolbe Foundation until December 20.
The Bobby Garcia murder seems to be linked to the “EMO” cult associated with the Cayo District.
To give some background, about 7 or 8 years ago there was a string of suicides in Benque Viejo Del Carmen. Several girls had taken their own lives in connection with the cult. One of these girls, Daisy Cerda, 19, had actually spoken about her attempted suicide in February 2011, two months before successfully taking her own life.
Cerda had said that her attempted suicide in February had no connection to the cult, and that it was because she was going through some personal problems. Her boyfriend had found her, and she was able to live. She said she was given the chance by God to speak to other troubled youth.
In April that year of 2011, though, she had tied a blue nylon string to a tree in Paslow Falls, near the river, right across the street from her boyfriend’s house, and hanged herself.
Cerda had written a note on a wooden table under the tree, apologizing to her parents and telling her family she loved them. She also wrote about her boyfriends and friends, but most frighteningly, were the words “EMO 4 life” and the digits 666 written on the table.
The suicides then moved on to Buena Vista, also in the Cayo District. One month after Cerda killed herself, in May 2011, Glenda Carranza, 17, drank Gramaxone and later died as a result at the Western Regional Hospital.
The village chairman, Eddie De La Rosa, had visited her in the hospital and said that one of her friends in school, whom she referred to as “boss,” told her that if she drank the poison she would not die, but rather, she and her family would be rich. She also told De La Rosa that on Tuesday and Friday evenings, she and the friend would go to the burying ground and pray to the devil because “EMO” apparently stands for “evil must overcome.”
While Carranza was in the hospital, different pastors would visit and pray for her. She kept saying, though, that she needed to comply with the rules of EMO. De La Rosa recalled that her parents would put a Bible beside her, and she would throw it away.
These are a couple of the stories that have been associated with the “EMO” cult. Garcia is the first known murder to be linked to the cult. This is not just speculation, any more, because, according to Bobby Garcia’s mother, Iris Garcia, she read the confession in which the killers admitted to sacrificing Garcia as part of the cult.
In an interview with News5, Iris said that in the teenagers’ confession, they said that had chosen Garcia to be sacrificed, and they pretended to be his friends in order to lure him to his death. They even admitted to belonging to the “EMO” cult and said that they had a sleepover to plan how they would kill him.
Bobby Garcia’s father, Ocsar Garcia, Sr., said that one of the boys had told police that they had always wanted to try human sacrifice, and that is why they led Garcia to the temple.
Iris Garcia said that one of the boys had been to her house and Garcia had introduced him as his friend. She said she could never believe that her son would have been killed as part of this cult’s rituals. She said that she did not see any remorse in the boys who killed her son.