In the past month, three women have been stabbed to death by their male partners - one with a screwdriver, two with knives. On December 16th, Ana Maria Magdalena Basto was in her home in Orange Walk when she was savagely stabbed with a screwdriver as many as 32 times and then had her throat slit with a surgical blade. And then on Christmas day in Belize City, Carol Gabourel was stabbed to death by her husband Cecil Gabourel. The third woman to die due to domestic violence is of course Keisha Sutherland this morning - she was stabbed 20 times in her chest and back. Her common-law husband Louie Ganzie is the prime suspect and as it is with all three deaths, the motivation was jealousy. One woman who has survived domestic violence and who has survived Louie Ganzie is Cheryl Barrow. 7 years ago Ganzie almost killed her but she lived to tell the tale. Here's her story.
Keith Swift Reporting,
30-year-old Cheryl Barrow still has the scars on her neck, her hand, and her shoulder and she vividly remembers the Easter Monday of 1999 when she was attacked by her then boyfriend - Louis Ganzie.
Cheryl Barrow,
"Bwoy it was an Easter Monday morning and that is when the man decided that he would kill me, but I didn't know that. He came and asked me if I wasn't going back home, because I had moved out from out of the house. I told him I wasn't going home back and that this is one morning he wioulkd have to do what he has to do because I won't go back home with him. I told him I got tired of him beating me for nothing. and the man left and came back. When he came back I didn't know he had a dagger knife on him and I walked into my dad's house and he hauled me back and when he hauled me back he started to 'juk' up me. He juked me up in my neck, my hands, see I have a L right in my hand here, and in my throat. I nearly died, I got six units of blood."
Cheryl says she met Keisha Sutherland last month and after seeing signs of abuse - she strongly advised and warned Keisha to leave Louie.
Cheryl Barrow,
"I spoke to her and I told her she would have to find a way how to get rid of him because the same he did, it is the same thing he will do you and it wasn't far from happening. I spoke to her, I told her but I think she should have never picked him up. She should have stopped and think that if he could have done that to that girl, what wouldn't he do to me."
Cheryl Barrow says she forgave Ganzie and so she didn't press charges. She now only wished she had given advice sooner about the man she both calls a monster and wicked.
Keith Swift,
The Louie Ganzie we've seen, this righteous 'emperor' is that the same Louie?
Cheryl Barrow,
"That is the same Louie but he is a monster. He is a wicked boy. He is wicked...violent is not the word. Violent is not the word, I think he is crazy; crazy crazy crazy."
Crazy- a long way off from the public Ganzie we have come to know as the emperor: spiritual, reflective, and respectful. And looking at it now, his case is perhaps a study in the many faces of abuse.
Cheryl Barrow is the mother of two of Ganzie's children, a thirteen and a 10-year-old son.
