Former Superintendent of Prisons Bernard Adolphus yesterday fought off two thieves who attempted to rob him at gunpoint. At around 3:30 Adolphus who owns and operates a security consultancy was at Belize Unit Trust picking up a deposit when he was accosted by a couple of robbers, one of whom pointed an Uzi in his face and cocked the weapon. That's enough to send a chill down anyone's spine, but the wily former solider and jail-keeper, told us that his military training kicked in and he listened for the ghosts in the machine.
Bernard Adolphus,
"The tall dude, tall character with a weapon, a Uzi, a black Uzi pointed it in my face and he told me to give him what I got. But the mistake that he made was he cocked the weapon and from my experience, when you cock a weapon there was no round in the chamber, no round was thrown in the chamber and I realized either we have no rounds at all and because I reacted. I reacted aggressively to try and secure the day's receipts.
This is from experience. Whenever you cock a weapon, you pull back the cocking mechanism and a round will go in automatically but in this case all he did as of though to frighten me and intimidate me, he cocked it and all I heard was metal against metal and it seems to me, and I know, that it is just the cocking device hitting the other section and it was not a smooth flow. Normally it would pull the round from the magazine and put it in the chamber. I didn't hear that. It was q quick reaction. Thank God I was trained, thank God I understood system, thank God I know how to react. And it was a split second reaction and I started to defend myself, and the main thing, securing the day's receipts. That was important to me, securing the day's receipt, which I did.
The one from behind attacked me and as a result all the packages went on the ground and I tried to secure it but I wasn't able to secure the checks. I was able to secure the cash. So as a result all the day's receipts, cash wise, was accounted for.
Yesterday I go back to all my experience to show these young chops that I might be old but I am not cold."
Police have since recovered a black car which was used in the commission of the crime. In it police found one of the checks that was stolen from Adolphus. They have also arrested 21-year-old Herman Eligio who was charged with the crime of robbery. Police are now looking for the other suspect.
