Mendoza's shooting was one of two which happened in Belize City this weekend. Resident's may have noticed that it rained quite a lot yesterday, but that didn't stop 2 men from robbing the Publics Clinic and Pharmacy on West Canal Street, and shooting the cashier because she refused to give them the money.
Police say that at around 11 on Sunday morning, 23 year-old Fatima Figueroa was working at the cash register for the P-Clinic and Pharmacy when 2 men entered through the front door. One of them was armed, and that man pointed the gun at her and demanded that she open the cash register. When she refused to comply, the man shot her in the left side of her abdomen. Shortly after, the men robbed a 38 year-old teacher of her sling purse which contained her $400 in cash, her cellular phone, her keys, and her passport, and her son's passport. The men then ran out of the business place and rode off on bicycles.
Today, the commander of Police Precinct 2 told us what investigators have been able to uncover so far about this crime:
Supt. Alden Dawson - OC, Police Precinct 1
"The police from the Crimes Investigations Branch Precinct 1, responded to a call of a shooting incident. They visited the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital where they saw one Fatima Figueroa, a 23 year old Salvadorian cashier from Publics Vegetable and Fruit Shop and she was seen suffering from a gunshot wound to the abdomen and the police began investigation during which time they learnt that while she was at work on West Canal Street at the Publics Fruits and Vegetable Store, two young men entered the store and made demands for money. She refused to hand over the money and one of the young men fired a single shot which caught her to the abdomen. Also at the time, there was a customer inside of the store, who was also robbed of her property being her sling bag with four hundred dollars cash, two bunches of keys, two passports and a cell phone. Quick police response led to the recovery of the firearm, a three-eighty, we believe may have been used in the robbery/attempted murder case. Also, it had at the time had four live rounds of ammunition in its magazine. We also recovered a sling purse with the two bunches of keys and the two passports. We have detained two persons so far and we look for two others at this time."
As noted in our interview, police are looking for 2 men, and they've detained a 53 year-old woman because of the recovered stolen items from the West Street house.
Witness told 7News yesterday that the robbers looked very young.
Fatima Figueroa is in a stable condition at the KHMH at this time.
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