BELIZE CITY, Wed. Mar. 23, 2022– On Tuesday, March 22, Wilmer Alexander Escobar, 23, a resident of Bella Vista Village, Toledo District, was convicted in the Supreme Court in Punta Gorda Town of the 2018 murders of Josephina Oh, 18, and Cresencia Oh, 20,—two sisters who lived in San Antonio Village in the Toledo District.
On Sunday, January 21, 2018, at about 11:00 p.m., Punta Gorda police arrived at a location two miles off the main road in San Jose Village in the Toledo District, where they saw the partially nude, mutilated bodies of the two young sisters, with multiple chop wounds on their heads, on the right side of the road. The women were later identified as Josephina Oh, 18, and Cresencia Oh, 20. A subsequent investigation revealed that the two women had been walking to their home in San Antonio after a church service in San Jose, when they were ambushed and attacked with a machete a couple of miles away from the village in an isolated area.
On January 31, 2018, police arrested Escobar, who was charged with two counts of murder. Escobar has been on remand since then. In a statement given to the police by Escobar, he had confessed to killing both women – who were strangers to him – and raping one of the sisters. Throughout the trial, which commenced in November of last year, however, he maintained his innocence and claimed that police had tortured him in order to coerce him to provide a confession. Escobar said that a JP (Justice of the Peace) who was present during the interrogation, could confirm his claims of police coercion; however, when the JP appeared in court, he denied Escobar’s claims.
During the trial, which was presided over by Justice Antoinette Moore without a jury, Escobar was represented by the now-deceased attorney Herbert Panton, and Senior Crown Counsel Javier Chan represented the prosecution. In January of this year, arguments concluded, and this past Tuesday, Escobar was found guilty by Justice Antoinette Moore in the Punta Gorda Supreme Court.
Escobar will be sentenced after a psychological evaluation is done and following the court’s receipt of a report from the Belize Central Prison. Escobar could be facing a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison before he is eligible for parole. He is expected to be sentenced later this year.