Tonight, a Mennonite family from Blue Creek Village in the Orange Walk District is angry and distrustful of the police department after they had a scary encounter with one of the specialized police units.
Peter Dyck is a well-known rice farmer from the community, and last night he and other family members were working late on his rice fields. At around 7:00, his wife and other family members were driving supper to him at the farm, but on the way there, they saw a suspicious vehicle blocking their path.
It turns out that this vehicle was a police mobile, but, it was dark, members of the Dyck family members were scared that they might be criminals. So, they took off and tried to escape from a party they thought could be kidnappers.
Police set chase, and that's when their vehicle was damaged by cops who tried to stop them. The Dyck Family claims that high-powered weapons were fired at them by the officers who tried to get them to stop.
This afternoon, Peter Dyck told us in a telephone interview that police are at fault for the commotion, the damage to his property, and the psychological trauma experienced by his wife and children, simply because they did not flash their police lights to announce who they were. Here's how he explained why:
Voice of: Peter Dyck, Alleges Police Brutality
"They continued going up the hill until they almost reach my mother's place, that is where a vehicle turn on its lights flashing and they started firing shots and so that is when my son slowed down and came to a stop and thats when they realize that it was police and then the police came and they started hitting them, threw my son to the ground, kicked him in his back."
Reporter
"It can be argued well you all misinterpreted a benigning or a harmless situation and your family in their unprovoked fright and confusion they are the ones who crashed into the gate. They are the ones who brought damage upon your property."
Voice of: Peter Dyck, Alleges Police Brutality
"The police did, absolutely no question. Because they did everything without markings, they didn't have the lights on when they were following them. If they would have turned on their lights my son would have slowed down immediately and stop, but they never turn up their lights. They were coming in darkness behind them at high speed. We are talking high speed here, because my family was running for their lives, because at the first instance by the bridge they thought that there was a kidnapping going on on themselves from whoever was blocking the bridge. We have no trust in the police anymore. They have betrayed that trust and so the police should not expect for us to trust them and we called these people terrorist right now."
Dyck says that he intends to make a formal complaint to the police about the alleged abuse, and the way the officers handled the chase. He says he also has international links to make the case of abuse known.
