The long weekend was full of activities - and many of them were centered in the Belize River Valley where the Ruta Maya was rolling through. Unfortunately, it probably also created the conditions for an deadly accident that claimed the lives of two persons, one of them a three year old girl.
The accident happened at around 5:15 near the first entrance to the village where 28 year old Lindbergh Tucker was driving a white Honda Civic SUV out of the village - when he collided with a KIA Sportage coming from the opposite direction. The Kia Sportage was driven by 31 year old Karim Silva- who was travelling along with his 3 year old daughter Ashley Silva, his wife and 2 other passengers. Silva and his family were at Bacab when he received a call from his sister who needed roadside assistance. He was on his way with his family when the tragic accident occurred.
Both Tucker and 3 year old Ashley passed away while receiving treatment at the KHMH.
Eyewitnesses reports suggest that that Tucker, the driver of the Honda Civic may have been under the influence and was driving in the wrong lane towards oncoming traffic.
Police say they are looking into what may have caused it:..
ASP Chris Noble, REGIONAL EXECUTIVE OFFICER
"We are looking into what may have cause it because the investigation has so far led us to believe that prior to the accident the driver who is now deceased may have side-swipe or had minor accidents with other vehicles, so we are hoping that those persons would come forward so as to have a better understanding of what actually happened."
"It is sad when people don't listen, people don't heed, but like I said before, you have to be careful, you have to be cautious in times of celebration. That is what we need to do, be cautious of the other person, be cautious of yourself. Know your limit and if you don't then don't do it, you know. My opinion at this point would not be relevant to anything but if you were drinking, if you were smoking, if you were flying, you have to come down to earth at some point."
"The checkpoints were prior. What happened [is that] we had rolling checkpoints in the area because we were anticipating drivers speeding. The La Ruta Maya does come with its own challenge and we had adequate personnel and transportation to work the area but, like everything goes, it's not every time that you have everything covered to an extent that it won't cause an issue."
"What happen we regulated the traffic in a particular manner - that was the entrance area. Our officers were spread out in certain area and we weren't enforcing it after we had established that that is the way the traffic is going to run. We actually had an area where we were stopping vehicles and we were re-directing them out of the village; that worked very good for us, so the bottlenecks and the confrontations would not have happen, but this person turned in an area where the officers were not and came back into traffic where we had regulations but the police officers were up ahead so we could not stop him."
Reporter
"Would you say that this person was speeding?"
ASP Chris Noble
"Speeding, I would not be able to say what speed, but you would have to have some level of speed to have caused the amount of damages you see on any one of the vehicles."
Police are awaiting the results of the autopsy to reveal if Lindbergh Tucker was intoxicated. Travelling inside the vehicle with Tucker was another person whom we were told is currently hospitalized in a coma.
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