Last night we showed you footage of the Western Highway murder. After 5:00 yesterday evening police were called out to mile 3, in a swampy area way off the highway. There, they found the body of 62 year old Salvador Marquez with several chop wounds to the head. The family told us today that everything seemed just fine yesterday morning when Marquez left to go fishing as he normally does. But it turned out to be far from ordinary when his son found his dead body on the beachside hours later. Here's what I found out today:...
Courtney Weatherburne reporting
Salvador Marquez always had his fishing gear laid out from early in the morning. His net along with this ice box attached to his bicycle.
Marquez would leave around 8:00 in the morning and ride to his favorite spot near mile 3 on the Western Highway, behind Tapir Nightclub.
Yesterday was no different. But now this coastline view that Marquez had been enjoying for 4 years is is now tainted by his murder.
Voice of: Elsy Acosta, relative
"Yesterday morning he left around 8:00 in the morning, my sister mother in law called him around 9:00. he told her that there was an accident so she told him just to be careful and he told her, God is with me,
I will be fine."
But he wasn't going to be fine at all. Reports are that Marquez had already caught some fish when he was attacked and chopped to death. It's only until later in the afternoon when he didn't return home, that his family tried calling him but his phone was off. So Marquez's son and mother went looking for him and made the grisly discovery.
Voice of: Elsy Acosta, relative
"My brother in law went and followed his daddy's footprints, my sister and her mother in law stayed in the vehicle, when my brother in law arrived at the spot where he found his daddy laying up on the seaside, he find out that he had a lot of chops in his face, back of his head his hand."
His relatives are stunned by his murder. They say Marquez had been robbed before in this area but they could have never imagined that anything like this would ever happen to him.
Courtney Weatherburne, 7News
"The other time they just robbed him and took his stuff away?"
Voice of: Elsy Acosta, relative
"Yes, they just asked him for his fish that he had already caught and he gave them and that was about it."
But it doesn't seem like it was robbery this time because, all Marquez's belongings were found with him, including his catch.
Courtney Weatherburne, 7News
"And do you have or does the family have any idea why anybody would want to target a 62 year old man?"
Voice of: Elsy Acosta, relative
"We have no idea, he was a person that didn't have any enemies and his son is a good person, he doesn't get into any trouble, so not even to say that his son did something and they targeted him so I don't know, everybody knows this man as a nice person as a quiet person because he had no trouble with nobody."
And that is exactly how Marquez will be remembered by his loved ones.
As you heard police say last night, they are still gathering information in this case. They had to call the Coast Guard for help to process the crime scene. Just to clarify, reports are that the body appeared to be decomposed but that was not the case, the foul smell was coming from the fish Marquez had caught, not from his body. Based on the post mortem examination, he was killed in morning, not too long after he had arrived. In terms of the case, the family says Marquez also took a machete with him and that was the only thing that was missing, but they say the machete was way too dull to be used to kill him. Marquez leaves behind his wife of 42 years, 4 grown kids and 7 grandkids. Marquez and his wife had just moved to Belize from El Salvador 4 years ago.
| 