Commissioner of Police Chester Williams, during an interview yesterday, said the adjudicator in the tribunal used the criminal standard of proof when considering the evidence presented instead of making a determination based on probability of guilt.  

BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Sept. 1, 2022

In November of last year, Corporal Elmer Nah and PC Manuel Caliz were found in possession of 139 rounds of .223 ammo issued by police at an Independence checkpoint following the landing of a drug plane near Bladen village in Toledo. Nah and Caliz were among several members of the Police Department, including members of the subsequently disbanded Commander of Operations Strike Team (COST), who were found in the area after the landing and were arrested and criminally charged. Nah and Caliz were also facing a police internal tribunal for the matter. Yesterday, however, the Commissioner of Police, Chester Williams, told reporters that the tribunal handed down a not guilty verdict in regard to the disciplinary charge of “Failure to Obey a Lawful Order” that had been brought against the two men – a decision that has seemingly angered Commissioner Williams.

“From what I was briefed by the Commander of the Professional Standards Branch is that the adjudicator who presided over the matter had found both gentlemen not guilty in respect to the ammunition that was found inside a vehicle that they were in at the particular time. I was further briefed that the acquittal came as a result of the testimony of another officer who testified to the tribunal that he had signed for those ammunitions and had left them inside the vehicle,” COMPOL Williams said.

But the vehicle referred to by that officer, who has since been identified as Richard Arnold, in his testimony was not the vehicle in which Nah and the ammunition had been found.

“Having looked at the circumstances is that the officer who testified to the effect that he had left the ammunition inside the vehicle – the vehicle in question that he had supposedly left the ammunition is not the same vehicle that the two gentlemen were found in and at the time had the ammunition in it, so I still cannot understand on what basis that the adjudicator decided that these two gentlemen were not guilty,” COMPOL Williams told reporters.

In November of 2021, the AMANDALA had reported, “Three vehicles were also found on the scene [near the drug plane landing], two of which are assigned to Assistant Commissioner of Police Marco Vidal’s Operation Unit… A number of high-caliber weapons were found inside one of the vehicles. That vehicle is said to belong to Sergeant George Ferguson. Ferguson was the most senior officer charged in connection to this bust, and was found on Friday, apparently after hiding out in the bushes near Bladen Village for some hours following the drug bust. He, along with three other police officers, Delwin Casimiro, Nelson Middleton, and Elmer Nah, all members of Vidal’s strike team, have been charged with Drug Trafficking and Landing a Plane at an unlicensed aerodrome.”

Following the recent handing down of the not-guilty verdict by the tribunal, Commissioner Williams requested the file containing the notes of evidence, and he says that his legal team will review the notes of evidence to “see whether or not the adjudicator erred in his decision acquitting the two gentlemen.” He also noted that as the Commissioner of Police he has the authority to review the merits of the decision and to possibly overturn it. “I will have to go through what the law allows me to do and see if in fact the adjudicator was right or he erred and if it is that we should find that he erred and if it is that we found that the adjudicator had erred, then the law does give the Commissioner the power to either maintain or uphold the current decision, reduce or to up it,” he said. At this time, the two men remain interdicted and out on bail, since they are still facing criminal charges.

In reference to the decision handed down by the adjudicator, Commissioner Williams commented that it appears that a standard of proof used in criminal proceedings—where guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt—is being applied in hearings inside the police tribunal, but he noted that the standard which should actually be used by the internal tribunal should be based on the probability of guilt, as is used in civil proceedings.

COMPOL Williams went on to say that Corporal Arnold may very well face charges if it is found that he has perjured himself by stating what he did in his testimony, or if any neglect on his part in handling the ammunition that was found can be determined.

“Even if it were that the officer who testified at the tribunal, he signed for this ammunition, had left them inside a vehicle, the vehicle in which he alleged that he left the ammunition is not the same vehicle in which the ammunition was found, so how the hell did the ammunition got from one vehicle to the other vehicle? Certainly these officers had to move it from one vehicle to the next, and that the reason why I cannot understand how the adjudicator could have accepted that testimony and acquit these two officers of the charge,” COMPOL Williams said.

Notably, in November, after the discovery of the weapons in the vehicle Nah was driving, the Minister of Home Affairs, Hon. Kareem Musa, had stated, “The ammunition that he had was assigned, and it is from the Police Department, and it is excessive in my personal opinion. He was on leave, so he was not ought to have had that ammunition.”