The funeral service for 20 year old Police Special Constable, Danny Conorquie was held yesterday in his home of Georgeville village. Conorquie was killed on Thursday at the Caracol Maya site, and the perpetrators are believed to be Guatemalan poachers - who were in the area illegally and cutting trees without a license. Police investigators are working on the theory - and it is a very disturbing one - that Thompson was killed merely as an act of retaliation against the state after a team of Belizean lawmen confiscated five horses and lumber form them earlier that day. Police say that Conorquie likely didn't have anything to do with it - but still was targeted for attack because he only had one other officer with him.
So, Conorquie, who was assigned to the Tourism Police Unit, died doing his job, protecting 12 tourists and a guide who were on the site - without a BDF escort that day because the soldiers didn't have any working transport.
Nationally, it's very heavy: a Belizean lawman - the first - killed by Guatemalan cross border bandits; but for his family, the weight is so much more: They lost a son and brother just as he was coming into adulthood. Yesterday afternoon, Danny, who aspired to be a full police officer received a police burial in his home village of Georgeville. Police from Cayo and the Tourism Police unit carried his coffin draped with the Belizean from the funeral service to a waiting police pickup. There was a procession on the Western Highway with a police escort, and a cordon of police officers. Senior police officers were also in the procession.
They escorted the body to the village cemetery where fellow lawmen lowered his body into the grave - followed by a gun salute.
At the funeral, Officer Commanding San Ignacio, Superintendent Dinsdale Thompson gave his farewell to the group. Like everyone else, he had only good things to say about Conorquie:
ASP Dinsdale Thompson OC, San Ignacio Police
"He said boss whenever I return from Caracol I want you to write a recommendation for me because I will go and join the next intake. I tell him yes Danny I will surely write that. I would have been in deed a pleasure to write a recommendation letter for Danny without any hesitation, like what his cousin a person with great quality, so Danny wanted to join the Police Department in the next intake that is coming very shortly. Whatever many people have said, Danny is indeed that type of individual that we know at the Police San Ignacio Formation. He will be greatly missed by the police department, by his family and the entire members of the police department and the Commissioner of Police, the CEO of the Tourism Unit. They will definitely miss him greatly. We have not just lost a special constable, but we have lost a great man; someone wonderful that we can in deed looked at as an icon for being a right standard of relating to the public. The right way of how to address people. He would many times come to my office along with Cpl. Young from the Special Branch in San Ignacio and other officers and said boss I want to borrow your gun, we are going out on a mission and would say here Danny go ahead. Whenever he comes back he would tell me all what he did. Danny was always committed. One time I gave him an assignment and later on I called him and ask if he had finish the assignment, he said no boss because an emergency came up with the other officers and I had to go. I said okay, I have trust in you and I know that you will do it. And when he came back he said I did it boss. He is indeed like what his mom was telling us that Danny would not give up."
And in that same address, Thompson took the opportunity to speak to the grieving friends and family about the progress of their investigation. He declared definitively to everyone that Conorquie was killed by a Guatemalan:
ASP Dinsdale Thompson OC, San Ignacio Police
"Now the issue pertaining his death in Caracol, we have done all that we can do in relating to investigation. Our officers went out there, we have done interviews and are still interviewing some more persons in relation to who have seen and have heard certain evidence that we can put together and what we have concluded with our investigation that it is not Belizean, it is not any other Central American but Guatemalans that did this. It is more than time for us Belizeans to raise up when it comes to those who want to just come upon our soil and take our lives or take our possession in the way that they are presently doing it. Tomorrow I understood that there is taking place a rally, a demonstration in support of the family, in support of peace within the country on Belize saying that we Belizeans we are tired of Guatemalans coming here and just intruding upon our lands and taking our lives, taking our substance just for the sake of taking them how they want. Danny life for sure we are celebrating, but it goes towards saying that it is time for us to rise up because when we see that other nationals coming in from other countries and killing the citizen of Belize, not only citizens but law enforcement officers - then it is saying something that we need not sit down anymore and allow activity or such type of behavior by foreigners upon this land no more, so as I said we are continuing our investigation and we won't leave any stone unturned and know for sure that our diplomatic part will be kicked in in relating to this to bring about the individual or individuals who have cause the death of Danny to persecution here in Belize."
Today, there was an un-precedented reversal of the position. 24 hours after he said it, and it made national headlines, the police press office issued a statement from Officer Thompson saying, quote, "I am hereby retracting what I had said publicly at the funeral. I would like to now say that we have no evidence to prove that the culprits who shot Danny Conorquie are from Guatemala."
If you're saying "wow!", so were we. But that sudden, sharp and rather embarrassing reversal is an effort on the part of the government to de-escalate tensions with the Guatemalans. This is much to the dismay of Conorquie's family who told the media on Friday that they were enraged by the comments of Foreign Minister Wilfred Elrington who cautioned against calling the culprits Guatemalans without certain proof of that.
But, there's only so far you can go with that because anyone who knows even a little about that area five kilometers from the Belize - Guatemala border knows that armed Guatemalans are all over it, and engaged in multiple illegal activities.
Today Prime Minister Dean Barrow issued a statement, quote, "There are reasons to believe that Guatemalan nationals may be responsible for the shooting and this has been communicated to the Guatemalan Authorities and the OAS. The Guatemalan Foreign Minister expressed his government's regret over the death of the Belizean Special Constable and offered full collaboration in the effort to bring the perpetrators to justice."
The statement also says quote, "The Prime Minister has spoken personally to Special Constable Conorquie's next of kin, and offered every assurance that the ultimate sacrifice made by this Belizean hero will not be forgotten....the Government commits to looking after the financial welfare of his immediate survivors." End quote.
The statement adds that "Every effort will continue to be made to strengthen the security arrangements in the border areas."
On Friday the BDF launched Operation Incisive Gallop 2, to clear illegal border incursions along the Chiquibul Forest.
During the last operation by the same name in May of this year, a total of 25 fields covering 125 acres were discovered and destroyed.
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