_{Jahiem Castillo, acquitted of murder}

BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Mar. 13, 2025

This afternoon, Jahiem Castillo, now 23, was acquitted of the murder of 37-year-old Cyril Gladston Jones, a father of two who was gunned down in front of his family at his door steps after he opened his door in 2018.

On the night of November 13, 2018, Jones was at home at around 8:00 when he heard a whistle. Jones went to open the door, and that’s when the gunman fired a single shot which hit him in his face, on the top lip. Jones fell to the ground and died on the spot.

According to police, Castillo, who was 16 years old at the time, was identified by a contractor of the island who did not see the shooting of Jones, but claimed he was shot at several times by the shooter shortly after Jones’ murder. Despite that contractor’s statement, however, Castillo was set free after the judge presiding over the case, Justice Candace Nanton, upheld a no-case submission made by Castillo’s attorney, Orson “OJ” Elrington, and withdrew the case,

Although he was acquitted of Jones’ murder, however, Castillo was remanded to the Belize Central Prison, where he is serving time for a separate criminal offense he was convicted of in 2024.

Castillo had just turned 16 a month prior to being accused of the murder.

In his no-case submission, Elrington submitted that the prosecution’s case relied solely on the alleged recognition of Castillo by Hinds; and, while Hinds never saw the person who pulled the trigger that killed Jones, he claimed to have heard the gunshots and saw the gunman as he was fleeing the murder scene.

Hinds told police in 2018 that the gunman fired shots at him, and he recognized him to be Jahiem.

Hinds described Jahiem as “red-skinned”, slim built, with afro hair and about 5’2″ tall; however, two other witnesses for the Crown, Aldo Ayuso and Jones’ wife, gave a contrasting description of the shooter as being dark-skinned.

And so, Elrington added in his no-case submission that Hinds’ identification of Castillo was by way of a group identification without the consent of the accused, which he argued was woefully short of being admissible.

Elrington added that the evidence adduced by the Crown was too tenuous for the Court to rely on, and he thus requested that the court stop the trial at that stage, since the evidence was not sufficient to convict his client.

Justice Candace Nanton agreed and acquitted Castillo of murder and attempted murder.

At the start of the trial, a voir dire had been heard to determine the admissibility of Hinds’ three statements which he had given to police in 2018.

The voir dire was held to determine the admissibility of the three statements given by Hinds to police, since the Crown submitted at the start of the trial that Hinds was fearful for his life and chose not to appear in court and testify.

And despite Justice Nanton admitting those three statements into evidence in the trial against Castillo on the basis of the Evidence Act, which allows for statements to be admitted into a trial when a witness is fearful for his life, she deemed them insufficient to seal a conviction.

Jahiem Castillo’s murder/attempted murder trial began in February of this year in a trial by judge alone, with no jury.