Since Monday 7News has been following up on reports of the body of a female found in shallow waters about thirteen miles south of Glover’s Reef. Today Dangriga police told 7News that they are may soon be able to positively identify the remains of the Hispanic woman. Because the body was in badly state of decomposition today a post mortem was finally performed on site by chief pathologist Dr. Mario Estradabran. Today the deputy officer in charge of Dangriga Police Inspector Alden Dawson told us that based on the results of the post mortem they no longer believe the woman was a victim of foul play but that she was among a group of Cuban refugees found stranded on Saturday. The passengers who had been drifting at sea for some nine days appeared to be severely dehydrated. Today we also spoke with one of the persons who came to the Cubans’ assistance. The man who prefers we call him just Alex is the station manager at Middle Caye at the Glover’s Reef Research Station. According to Alex he and a group of divers were on their way back from a trip when they spotted what he described as a makeshift vessel with fourteen passengers on board. Alex told us via telephone that also believes the dead woman may have been one of the passengers on board the vessel.
Alex,
“Myself and a few other representatives were coming from a dive up in the Northeast point for the spawning aggregation and we spotted the boat out from the reef, pretty close in looking like it was washing in and so the captain dropped us back at the caye and went back to see what was going on to collect them if they needed it. But if it was a refugee boat which we thought it might be and so he went out and picked them up. Apparently they were shouting for water. They were really dehydrated when he picked them up and he brought them back to Middle Caye. They were in like a home constructed boat with like a sheet for a sail, very simply built boat and packed full of people so that kind of gave it away. We heard their story, none of them spoke English but a few speak Spanish here so they said they came from Cuba like the east region of Cuba, they had been at sea for 15 days for the last 9 days they had been without water and they were catching rain water with like a tarpaulin and then drinking from that. They were different; there was a nurse among them and a professor of Spanish literature and things like that. I can’t remember any of their names but they seem like they were just trying to get away from Cuba and start a new life. They were really dehydrated. You could tell because they were crying for water and they were also just looked really weak. Especially the women couldn’t really walk with any strength, they had to be kind of supported and they were just malnourished and really dehydrated. Even last year we had bodies washing up because of that boat that went missing with the Magistrate and the body was found here. It is actually not that unusual but I guess you couldn’t help but link the two events together and I think people were kind of curious as to whether they were linked.”
Jacqueline Godwin,
Inspector Dawson police in their press release had said they suspected foul play. Following today’s post mortem, you no longer believe that this woman may have been killed. Why?
Inspector Alden Dawson,
“At this time we don’t believe that it is foul play at this time. The reason being that we have reason to believe now or we have information leading us now to believe that this person now was one of the fourteen or fifteen Cubans that were out there making their way to Honduras and got stranded. We believe that this person may have become dehydrated and was left out there by the other surviving persons.”
Jacqueline Godwin,
Is there any identification on the body or on the clothes that she was wearing that indicated that she may have come from Cuba?
Inspector Alden Dawson,
“At this time the person was wearing a t shirt displaying the name Cuba and like I said we have an investigation ongoing and we have at this time to reason to believe that that person is one of the 15 Cubans that were picked up earlier this week by Independence Police. At this time we have the Cubans detained and a portion of them are at the Hattieville facilities, prison, and there are four of them here in Dangriga who had to seek medical attention and at this time we are receiving some cooperation from two of the Cubans at this time.”
Jacqueline Godwin,
What are they saying?
Inspector Alden Dawson,
“Like I said the investigation is ongoing as we speak, they are being interviewed and we are getting at this time some cooperation which may lead us to the identity of that decomposed body.”
Presently two of the Cubans who were discharged from the hospital are now being questioned by Dangriga police while two others remain in the southern regional hospital. According to police because of Immigration offences the other ten Cubans have been remanded to Hattieville Prison.
