COROZAL TOWN, Tues. Oct. 2, 2018– Retired immigration officer Eugene Middleton, 65, of Halls Layout, Corozal Town, was held up on Olga Marin Drive in Halls Layout at about 10:00 Saturday night by two armed robbers. He pleaded with them not to kill him; one of them punched him in the face and they sped away in his pickup.
Middleton later reported the robbery to the Corozal police at about 7:00 Sunday morning. After making the official report, he and his brother-in-law began to search for his vehicle, and they found it abandoned in San Antonio, Corozal District.
Information to us is that when Middleton found his vehicle, the spare wheel, pickup keys, car stereo, and car battery were missing, and all the gas in the tank had been sucked out. He then called police, who lifted fingerprints from the vehicle.
After police concluded their investigation, Middleton and his brother-in-law towed his vehicle back to his house.
Middleton said that while driving on Olga Marin Drive, he stopped at a junction to give way to a vehicle to pass, when suddenly, two armed men came out of the bushes on either side of his vehicle. They approached the front passenger door of the car and ordered him to get out of his pickup.
Fearing that they would shoot him, he got out and they ordered him to get back in and he was put in the middle of them on the front seat of his vehicle, and they drove away with him as hostage. That was when he pleaded with them not to kill him, but to take the vehicle. The robbers, who were not wearing masks, then returned him to the junction from where they had taken him, and drove away in his pickup.
In an interview on CTV 3 News, Corozal Town, Middleton said that the area is getting dangerous and police should increase patrols in the area. He is not primarily worried about himself, he said, but he fears for members of the public who walk or ride bicycles in the area, because of the increase of robberies in the area.
Middleton said that on the night he was robbed, he felt fearful about going home, so he did not return to his house that night, but slept at the home of a relative, then went to the police the following morning.