Cops clash with civilans after casino!

Cops clash with civilans after casino!
Author: Stacey Kelly

What Rodney Lino and Patrick Menzies experienced early Sunday morning around 4:00 is normally seen only in the movies, but a series of events leading to a cruel beat-down by some off-duty policemen was all too real, leaving Lino’s face unrecognizable and Menzies narrowly escaping a shot intended for his head.

Lino, 29, a bodyworks mechanic and a deacon of Mount Zion 7th Day Adventist Church, and Menzies, 26, a truck driver/laborer, told us that around 3:30 - 4:00 a.m., Sunday, June 5, 2011, both of them were leaving Princess Hotel and Casino when Lino accidentally bumped into a female who was with a young man in civilian clothes.

Menzies and Lino claim that the same man, along with another man and a team of policemen, reportedly from the Gang Suppression Unit (GSU), beat them up later that same morming.

According to Lino, after he accidentally bumped into the young woman, he apologized and told her that it was an accident. The woman, Lino said, accepted his apology, but her male friend would not let go of the matter.

“Apparently, when I saw the first guy was coming across, that’s when I realized that this group was together,” said Lino. “Immediately, as he came across he asked the young lady what was the problem. The young lady said the same thing, that nothing was happening, and that he already apologized, and it was one little bump to the shoulder.

“It looked like he didn’t really want to hear that, so he just punched me in my mouth first, and when he punched me in the mouth, I just moved backway; I saw the other one coming across, dressed as civilian the same way, so we didn’t know it was police.”

He said that at that point, the man called the other friend. Speaking of the other man, Lino said,

“When he came across he asked the same thing, what was going on, and the young lady said the same thing. It looks like he didn’t want to hear that either, so he just turned like he was walking away, and that is when he bucked me with his elbow. And that is how I ended up busting my chin. So when that happened, I left it like that, still,” he related.

Menzies was, according to their account, standing at another section of the parking lot, guiding some friends who were trying to navigate out of their parking spot, and he claims to have witnessed the elbowing of Lino on his chin by the second man.

Menzies told us that he approached the two men and Lino and asked what the problem was, and that the two men did not reply, but just walked away.

While Menzies and Lino were later driving out of the compound, in the direction of BTL Park, they saw the two attackers, and Lino pointed them out to Menzies. “I saw a guy and a girl and another guy and a girl behind walking, two couples; I thought they were just civilians like myself,” recalled Menzies.

Menzies said he then attempted to intimidate one of the men by swerving the car toward him as if he were going to hit him with the vehicle, but at that very point the other man stepped forward and was actually hit with the car.

“When he stepped out into the street, I done was going down on my gas, because now I no di stop because I done frighten already,” said Menzies.

Menzies said that at this point they (Lino and himself) were scared. Immediately, he said, shots were fired in their direction, and they drove away with haste from the gunfire.

“When the car hit him, one of the men, I heard repeated gunshots fired, right, immediately afterward, so I thought to myself, how they allowed these guys in Princess, and it still didn’t dawn on me that these guys are policemen,” Menzies explained. He said he then felt a burning sensation and upon looking he saw a hole in his jeans.

“They shot out the back glass, and you can see clearly where they are aiming for my head,” Menzies told us.

The bullet grazed the side of Menzies’ left outer leg, while the bullet that went through the back glass missed. Menzies, who is about six feet tall, told us that he had ducked.

Both men then drove to Lino’s home, which is located in an open yard in the Mahogany area, where about five other homes are situated, one of which belongs to Lino’s mother.

Twenty minutes later, after Lino and Menzies had resolved to stay there and rest until they could get their uncle to escort them to the police station later that morning, they heard a knock on the door. Lino went to open the door while Menzies was lying on the bed.

“It was like two or three truckloads of police,” related Menzies, “and they brought back the same young man that elbowed him in his chin, to come and beat him again, still in civilian clothing. They repeatedly banged on the door, saying that they were police.” Menzies said that when they looked through the window and saw that it was the police, Lino opened the door.

“When he, Lino, opened the door, that is when they, the police, pushed it in and he fell. I saw four or five policemen just kicking him,” said Menzies.

Witnesses told Amandala yesterday that there were three men dressed in civilian clothes and six officers dressed in GSU uniforms.

“If you look at Lino’s face, those aren’t punches you know, those are kicks, and when I heard him screaming out, well, I am preparing now to get my beating, because I know they are going to do me the same thing, so I just lay down and put my hand behind my back, as well”, said Menzies.

Lino, for his part, told us that when he opened the door, he was kicked and tackled to the ground by an army of men, one of whom was the man in the civilian clothing who had beaten him up earlier that morning.

At this point, neighbors, and even Lino’s mother, were denied access to the house by the policemen, who reportedly told them, “Nobody can’t come in here; this is a crime scene.”

Lino says he was kicked numerous times in the face and body.

Menzies told us that when he saw Lino’s face after the attack had subsided, he was shocked, because he could not recognize his friend.

The men told Amandala that at that point, the police took Lino’s bloody clothes from him and cleaned up the blood in the house with alcohol.

Menzies was also beaten and a steel fan was broken on his upper back. He said that he was taken out of the house in handcuffs and was lifted up higher than the back of the police truck and then hurled head-forward into the truck by three officers. He claims that one of the officers remarked that his face did not look like his badly beaten friend’s face, and that another officer told him not to worry—that when they reached the Queen Street police station they would “make his face match his friend’s one.”

According to Menzies, he was later taken into a room where he was made to kneel down in handcuffs for two hours.

“One of the policeman said that I lucky that it wasn’t him that shoot after me, because I woulda dead, so that was a straight threat to me,” he added.

Amandala inspected the car on Sunday, while it was parked inside the Queen Street Police Station. We observed that almost all the tint had been removed, except for the front windshield. In the back glass of the car, directly on the driver’s side, was a hole caused by a bullet, which would have surely caused serious injury to Menzies’ head if he had not ducked to the side, as he claims he did.

Later Amandala visited the “crime scene” on Sunday evening along with Lino and Menzies, who had been released from custody around 5:30 p.m., and we saw traces of blood around the entrance of the house and in the bedroom.

Menzies is the first cousin of murdered deacon, Teddy Murillo, and nephew of activist Danalyn Murillo.

Menzies also claimed he was denied his phone call. An officer told him that, “No phone call for you because you look like a bit@#”.

Around 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, the families of both men were able to secure a lawyer, who then spoke to both Lino and Menzies inside the cell for about thirty minutes. After the visit, the attorney made a few calls and was able to get both men out of the cell.

“When they done beat us up, they took us to the station and when they saw the pain I was in, they ended up taking me to the hospital,” said Lino. “I am very angry because I mean, they could have come better than this. I felt like four or five of them were kicking me. I was full of blood, the clothes I had on was so bloody that they told me to just take off the clothes and clean up myself, and the floor. They then put the clothes in a black plastic bag and took it,” he said.

“I would want to see the officers that did this to me pay for it as well; they should realize that they have a family, as well, you know, they have their wife or their common-law wife with children, and they wouldn’t want anyone to go out there and do to their family, the same thing that they did to me, right? I mean, come on, we are not bad people; we go to church and nothing wrong to just take a little time and have a little fun. We never been arrested before; first time something like this happen to us,” Lino went on to say.

Since Menzies’ and Lino’s detention, they have not been charged by police. Their families, who want action against the officers, have been visiting with different authorities in hopes of getting their complaints heard. This evening the family made a stop at the Ombudsman’s office.

Late this evening, police sent out a press release which addressed parts of this story. The release stated that, “Belize City police are investigating a traffic accident that has left a police officer injured, and an allegation of police brutality. PC Casimiro reported that he was exiting the Princess Hotel and Casino along with other police officers and civilian friends, where they were approached by a female who alleged that she was being harassed by a male person who was in the compound.

“The police approached the male person who was behaving in a boisterous manner, where an argument ensued.”

The release ended by saying that the officer claimed to have been knocked down from behind; however it did not mention the gunshots alleged to have been fired by one of the off-duty officers, or the invasion of the home by elements of the GSU and police.

The release concluded by stating that, “The Commissioner of Police has ordered an immediate investigation to be conducted by the Crimes Investigations Branch, Traffic Branch and the Internal Affairs Office.”