The Magistrate's Court is closed for two weeks, but special arrangements were made to arraign the four prison escapees who were caught over the past week.
26-year-old Eutychus Nunez, 23-year-old Elser Oseguera, 25-year-old Luke Bowen, and 27-year-old Kendale Flores were escorted to court #1 just before noon today.
They appeared before Magistrate Albert Hoare and were read a single charge of escape.
The men all pleaded guilty and were given a one year sentence. The sentence is to run consecutively with any other sentences they may already be serving - meaning they will serve an additional year in jail.
When the foursome left court, they weren't happy and voiced their displeasure to our court reporter:
Prisoners "They chance we da prison, they take our rights lightly da prison. I want the whole of Belize know they take we lightly da prison, they chance we because we are take 6 months for a repeat offender that something that is not even in a law book, you know, Virgilio Murillo really take we likely you know, I want the whole of Belize know that too - and PUP to win too boss, that's right, big up to Johnny, big up to Johnny, we are human beings."
Five escapees are still at large Micheal Faux, Jaroud Lamb, Enrique Martinez, Erwin Lanza, and Carlos Montejo.
COVID infections continue to surge at the prison and a release that just came out says that the Ministry of Health "deployed a team of officers from its headquarters and the Central Health Region to assess the developing situation at the Kolbe Foundation."
And here's why! There was random rapid testing across the prison on October 27, 2020. 190 samples were taken and 90 samples were reactive for COVID-19. That's almost 50%!
A release says, the Ministry of Health is working closely with prison officials to further manage and contain the spread at the prison facility. The Ministry has advised for further enhancement of sanitary measures to continue to safeguard the overall health of the inmates.
