MILE 21, George Price Highway, Thurs. Oct. 25, 2018– Just before 4 o’clock yesterday morning, October 24, six girls escaped from the Princess Royal Youth Hostel at Mile 21 (Rockville) on the George Price Highway. Reportedly, these girls were some of the same girls who had recently been charged for damage to the Hostel’s property.
The girls had allegedly been seen running in the direction of Belmopan, but when police went to search for them, they found no signs of the girls. At press time tonight, however, a report has surfaced that the girls have been found, but we were unable to verify the report .
On October 2, ten girls had broken through some loose sheets of zinc in order to gain access to the roof. The girls were protesting a change in routine with which they did not agree. Members of the BDF had to be called in to help bring the girls down to safety.
Also, in April of this year, some 13 girls locked an officer in a room at the Hostel and began to destroy the Hostel’s property. They reportedly entered another room and wrecked everything in it, including a sofa set, a flat screen TV, DVD player, laptop, computer monitors, ironing boards and a ceiling fan. The value of the damaged items was estimated at $12,000.
In May 2016, several girls had also escaped from the Hostel. At around 6 a.m. on May 17, three girls climbed over the fence and eight girls went through the gate that was left unlocked.
This was a massive black-eye for the hostel, especially after a tragedy just a few months before, on November 29, 2015, when 3 girls – Anna Carlos, 16, Shadisha Arnold, 16, and Elizabeth Mckoy, 14 – perished in a fire in one of the dorm rooms. Reports were that they had escaped from the Hostel with another girl, who was only 12. When they were caught, the three older girls were locked in one room, and the 12-year-old girl was locked in another room, as punishment.
The three were supposed to be locked in for 24 hours, and, wanting to escape, they set a pillow on fire with a lighter they had snuck in, hoping someone would see the smoke and open the door for them. When the fire started to get out of control, the girls, in an effort to douse it, covered it with a blanket, but this only fed the flames.
Unfortunately, the wardens on duty were busy elsewhere at the time, and by the time they became aware of the girls’ cries for help the room was already ablaze.
The officers struggled to open the lock, but were unsuccessful, so they broke the dorm’s wall to try and free the girls. By the time they were able to do that, however, it was too late: the girls had burned to death. No one was ever held accountable.