It's a crime that has left the quiet community of Lord's Bank in stunned disbelief: how could two men have gone into a neighborhood home on Friday, raped and killed the maid and then just walked out carrying some small change and a few electronic items? Well that's the question police and the media have been asking to, and today Alfonso Noble went looking for answers.
Alfonso Noble Reporting, Email - [alfnoble@yahoo.com]
On Friday morning 20-year-old Mara Naomi Garcia went to work in this neighborhood known as the Hollywood Area of Lord's Bank Village. She arrived at this home at around 8 when the owner and his family left. It is sometime shortly after, that police say she was attacked.
Sr. Supt. Mario Vernon,
"She was on the outside of the house, within a fenced premises, washing up pots and pans. It would seem that whoever entered that premises hustled her inside the house proceeded to sexually abuse her on the upper flat of this two-storey building. Thereafter I suspect very much that she was tied up and put to sit in one of the smaller settees in the lower flat and interrogated as to where any valuables may have been in that home, and she may have frustrated her attackers, or was not cooperative, or simply did not know where the family kept their valuables. And so she was slit across the throat and it was a deep swipe that almost took off the head. Its just somebody just got crazy or pressed too hard and on that cutting instrument. A very sharp instrument was used, and someone could have been agitated by not getting the answers to their questions, and just meddling around with that sharp an instrument at someone's throat may have caused a deeper slice than you would expect to cause, and of course was banded with a thorn piece of shirt. The hands and feet were tied with strings, strings. We're not into ascertaining what type yet but it seemed to have been shoelaces."
Head of National CIB, Sr. Superintendent Mario Vernon, who is personally taking charge of the investigation, says that Garcia was left inside the home where she had been killed while the person or persons responsible ransacked the house. It was not until the homeowner returned at around 4 in the afternoon that the discovery was made.
Sr. Supt. Mario Vernon,
"What we noticed was that certain things were out on the verandah that should have been inside, and when he got into his premises, he noticed that a key was in the burglar bar door to the lower flat and the wooden door was closed but not locked. Upon entering he noticed also where things were still left untidy and then went in further into the house and met this discovery. They found her in the living room. Her both hands and feet were bound and there was a cloth that was banded around her mouth as if to muffle any sounds that may been coming from her. She was dead at the time and the rigamortis that had set in, at that hour, would indicate to the police that she may have been killed sometime during the morning."
But while the killing seems to be particularly brutal, Vernon speculates that the perpetrators were mere petty thieves who are from the area and who were casing the house, despite a billboard warning of a neighborhood watch.
Sr. Supt. Mario Vernon,
"It shouldn't have been no less than two persons but no more than three and it was a crime of opportunity by who I believe are residents of Ladyville Village and who are idlers and petty thieves. The amount of trace evidence that were left just lying there tells me that whoever entered that house blundered, blundered a lot. I am saying that if they blundered so much inside that house, they will blunder on the outside also because they were not professionals. We are dealing with some amateurs and petty hustlers that took the opportunity that morning with a petite young lady in charge of that house, and because of the surrounding areas on the perimeter of the premises, it made it an ideal situation for some one to have been lurking on the outskirts to ascertain whenever the family moved out and then took that opportunity to go in. What is said to be missing from the home at this time are what would be attractive to a thief: a DVD player, a camera, some jewelries, some little bit of cash that people would normally keep within the home for urgent expenses; nothing substantial as such. There was a container with such Belizean small change and the person, or persons, went about selecting the shillings and the dollar coins."
Today Gabriella, Mara's mother could still not come to terms with what had happened to her daughter.
Gabriella Garcia, Victim's Mother
[Translated from Spanish] "It was already 6:30 and I was at the door waiting for her but she never came. Then the police came and told me they have bad news for me. I asked if it was my daughter, they said yes she was raped and killed. [Crying.] I never expected this. I wish they would suffer they way I am suffering now. She did not do anything to anyone for them to do this to her if they catch them they should be punished that's what I feel. This is something that you can never forget this was a bad thing. I ask myself why they did not just tie her up. They did not have to kill her but they killed her and that is what hurts me the most."
And while this mother is in stunned grief, police are now scanning the Ladyville area to find the killers.
Maura's mother, Gabriella Garcia has had her own brush with misfortune. Nearly three years ago, on august third, 2002 she was shot at her taco stand by a robber who got angry because she didn't have any money. The family is now trying to return 20-year-old Maura's body to Guatemala for burial, and anyone who would like to assist with that effort can contact the family at number 34 Queen Charlotte Street.
