by Charles Gladden

BELMOPAN, Thurs. Sept. 15, 2022

Troy Banner, 31, a resident of Camalote, Cayo District, returned on Tuesday, September 13, to the Magistrate Court in Belmopan, where he is facing charges for grievous harm, cruelty to a child and wounding in connection with injuries he allegedly inflicted on his 15-day-old baby, who was rushed to the Western Regional Hospital in August of this year with a fractured arm, as well as bruises in the child’s face, chest and back.

Banner had claimed that the baby had fallen off the bed, and was injured as a result, but according to the Police Department’s ASP Alfonso Aban, who is the Officer Commanding the Criminal Investigations Branch, charges were brought against Banner following a statement by the mother of the newborn child.

At the time that ASP Aban made that announcement, he had also noted what has seemingly been a pattern of abusive behavior by Banner against his own children, which he said the Police Department would be investigating. Of note is that in June 2019, Banner had been arrested and charged with manslaughter for the death of his two month-old child, Thevane Banner. He had claimed that the child had choked while being fed. After an autopsy was conducted on the child, however, it was discovered that baby Thevane’s death was the result of multiple skull fractures and head trauma consistent with Battered Child Syndrome.

Before being charged, he had tried to blame the nurses at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital for the 2-month-old baby’s death—claiming that they gave the child too much adrenaline and that they were trying to make it appear as if the child had been abused.

In June of that same year, Banner’s ex-common-law wife, who is the mother of his eldest child, also made abuse allegations against him. She said that seven years before, her child had suffered a fractured skull as well as bruises after being in Banner’s care, but had survived the abuse.

Banner must return to court on October 27.