BELIZE CITY, Tues. Dec. 15, 2020– Belize City recorded two murders yesterday evening, Monday, December 14, on its southside. The first occurred at around 7:30 p.m. on Neal Pen Road. A gas attendant, Micah Baltazar, 19, of a Holy Emmanuel Street address, had left his uncle’s residence on Kraal Road and was walking on Neal’s Pen Road when an unknown gunman fired several shots at him, which caused fatal wounds to his body. He died at the scene.
Investigators believe that Baltazar may have been targeted because he was from “turf” that has been labeled enemy territory by criminal elements in the area where he was killed. Police are seeking a known suspect.
“What we understand is that Mr. Baltazar had just exited his uncle’s residence, which is somewhere on the Kraal Road area and was walking on Neal Penn Road when he was approached by someone who fired several shots at him, causing his death…we have been gathering some information and so far, we know that he is not from that area and because he hangs out at another location, we believe that this is the motive why he was shot,” said police.
Baltazar’s aunt, Vivian Cumiss, said that the family is devastated. “I won’t say Micah is an innocent [person] and that he’s a perfect person, because to be honest, nobody is perfect. Micah has his ways, but at home, and what I personally know about Micah, he is a very humble person…we were very much devastated about the situation, but being believers in Christ, we are leaving the situation to the Lord,” she said.
Investigators have labeled this homicide as gang-related.
An hour and twenty minutes later, at 8:50 p.m., police officers attached to the Crime Investigation Branch from Precinct 1 were deployed to Ebony Street, where they found Keith Courtenay, 26, lying dead on a verandah. The delivery man was seen with multiple gunshot wounds in the body on the wooden verandah of his cousin’s house, which is elevated several feet above the ground.
Courtenay and a relative were on the verandah when they were attacked by two armed men who entered the yard, ran up the wooden stairs and fired multiple shots at the men.
The relative, who remains unnamed at this time, escaped unscathed. Investigators have determined that Courtenay was not the intended target.
Edmund Williams, uncle of the deceased, said that he has no faith in the criminal justice system: “This is going right down the drain, just like all the rest of the murders; just like how I see mothers crying on TV, my mom will cry the same way, my sisters and brothers will cry the same way… We will have the memories in our hearts and the rest of the country is just going to forget. It’s just another black man dead, another black father dead,” Williams said.
The mother of Courtenay’s daughter said that even though their relationship was on “choppy seas”, Courtenay always took care of his two-year-old daughter, who turns three next week.
He also has another daughter who is seven years old.
