A family in Belize City is desperately worried tonight after 19-year-old Andrew Castro did not return home from a trip he took to Caye Caulker.
Police report that on Sunday night at 9:30, he was with two friends on a 26-foot skiff returning from Caye Caulker when he fell out of the boat when it crashed into a house, which rests above the open sea.
Tonight, the teenager - an experienced fisherman is presumed drowned, the result of a drunken mishap - but his family is not satisfied with that story. Now the family is left with more questions than answers as one of the men who knows what happened to the 19 year old is giving conflicting reports while another says he simply does not know what happened - Alfonso Noble has been asking questions.
Alfonso Noble Reporting,
On Sunday afternoon 19 year old Andrew Castro set off on a trip to Caye Caulker in a 25-foot skiff belonging to his father. His family says that's the last they knew of him until around 11:30 last night when a person who was in the boat on the return trip to Belize city along with Castro called in to give the family some very bad news.
Lucia Castro, Mother of Missing Man
"We were waiting for them and around 11:30 my husband told me he got a call that Kenrick Gordon called him saying Andrew crashed into a wall and he flipped over the boat and he dropped over and they couldn't find him."
"Now it is a different story. This young boy is saying that one of them was drunk and sleeping in the boat and Andrew was driving. Then he said Andrew went to lie down next to him and that's when he crashed the boat. He said when he woke up he saw the Andrew flipping over and then he saw Andrew swimming away from the boat and he didn't want to come back into the boat."
"He said they were going towards Andrew to pick him up but they said the machine (engine) went dead or it didn't work. Then later on I heard a different story about a big wave which flipped him over and washed him away and from that they never saw Andrew again."
"Something went wrong there and I know that young boy who was along with him is hiding something and that is why he is giving different stories."
And while the mother searches for a story that seems true to her, a third person who was in the boat at the time of the mishap cannot help with any part of it. Steven Sanchez says he was sleeping at the time, he'd passed out because he was drunk. He remembers being awakened after Andrew went overboard.
Steven Sanchez, Passenger on Boat
"All I know is when Kevin woke me up. All I know is from then and he told me that he saw Andrew drop overboard and then we tried hollering for him. Then he said that how Andrew was swimming away from the boat but yet he said that he didn't see him because it was too dark. I really don't know what it is because I was sleeping and he woke me and told me. If he said he saw the person drop overboard then he should have gone and tried grabbing or helping him. I don't know why he would come and wake me or maybe he left it and made us drift away and then tried to wake me."
Alfonso Noble,
"So all this while - there might be a struggle. You were asleep?"
Steven Sanchez,
"Yes I was asleep"
Alfonso Noble,
"How could you be asleep?"
Steven Sanchez,
"Because I was drunk."
Alfonso Noble,
"Were you the only person in the boat drunk?"
Steven Sanchez,
"No. Andrew Castro too.
Alfonso Noble,
"So you just passed out?"
Steven Sanchez,
"Yes because Kevin told me the boat crashed. So from the time the boat crashed and I didn't wake up means I was gone (drunk). If it had even crashed and I was asleep, and the whole bow front broken in then I could have also died."
Alfonso Noble,
"Do you know that boat crashed though?"
Steven Sanchez,
"I don't know. This is what Kevin Gordon told me and that's when I woke up."
Alfonso Noble,
"So what do you think happened?"
Steven Sanchez,
"I don't know. I was sleeping. I don't know what happened."
Even so family members know for sure that Andrew Castro is missing and now they've set out to try and find him and put the story together.
Lucia Castro,
"I feel like they pushed or maybe knocked or whatever. Or maybe they pushed it and from there left him to drown and did not want to help him. If he conscious were he was or it wasn't in the deep then he can swim. He could be alive. But what if it wasn't there?"
"I want justice. I want the police they look into that. I want them to dig out information from that same young boy because something wrong here. My son is an expert fisherman. He can swim and he can dive. He has been at sea from he was 6 years old so he knows the sea. He goes back and forth from Caye Caulker."
"We can't find him, we can't locate him. We don't know if he is alive or dead and that is why my husband went back to look for him. I just want to see him alive or for them to find him. Let us get justice and put it in police hand."
Andrew Castro was the father of a one year old.