He is a school teacher and his brother is a police officer but German Tzul says that on March 5th – he and his brother Damian were locked down like common criminals. It all has to do with a murder that occurred on election day in Chan Pine Ridge Village. Jose Cal was killed and the prime suspect in his murder was Honduran national Luis Cardona and was detained by Orange Walk Police. He is the brother in law of the Tzul brothers. German says that when they went to check on him - they ended in jail too. He told us that he felt violated.
German Tzul,
“The officer who was at the station at the time, the diarist informed my brother that he was being detained as well. My brother was very much surprised as I said and he called me. I do not live far from the police station and I went to find out what was the situation because in my mind it was getting more serious. I was informed that I too was being detained. The two of us were locked down for about five hours. No reason was given to us, no justification as to why we were being locked down.
We later found out that we were detained because we were being held as suspects into the case. Very little has been done by the police to really investigate what really happened. Subsequently after the attack the fellow died and after my brother in law was released, he is not a Belizean, he is a Honduran national, his trip was already scheduled to leave Belize so he left for Honduras where he is at now. Now much to our disappointment, people are saying he left the country because of guilt which that is not the case.”
German Tzul has written a letter to the Ombudsman and the Commissioner of Police seeking redress. As for the Jose Cal murder, no arrest has been made and Luis Cardona it seems remains the police’s prime suspect. He left the country after his release from police detection but his family says that trip was already planned. They claim he hasn’t returned to Belize because he feels he will again be arbitrarily detained and won’t be given a fair hearing to defend himself.
