7 News Belize

What GSU Commander Says On Kraal Road
posted (September 3, 2014)

But that's today's allegation of GSU excess. What about the ones from last week? As we told you, residents from Kraal Road told 7News last week Thursday that officers from the Unit descended upon them and doled out a heavy dose of beat down.

At the time, we were unable to reach the new commander for comment, and we aired our story. Yesterday, we got a chance to speak with him about those allegations coming from Kraal road, and in his response, he accused Channel 7 of airing rumours. It turned into a back and forth about ethics, but here's his main criticism of our story:

Inspector Mark Flowers, Commander - GSU

"They were alleging on the news cast that some people were beaten or something to that effect and because they news media was there, you guys were there and they reported on a third party situation. Somebody said that somebody was beaten yet they did not find the need to in the least bit confirm this allegation. It is troubling indeed when they news media will report third hand information without even attempting to verify. And these are the sentiments that are causing problem, not only for the police, but for everybody. If in fact somebody was beaten, why didn't they just interview the person, or try to video the injuries to the person. They claimed that somebody had regurgitated there, they did not show anything to suggest that what they were reporting was even true."

Daniel Ortiz

"Sir, but at that time our camera crew and news team was outside, they couldn't go inside where the officers were operating."

Mark Flowers

"They were out here, the people who was allegedly beaten were here. The police left at some point in time, couldn't the news media take the responsibility to at least confirm and question one of these persons, opposed to reporting a third party story. This is not news now, this is gossip. Somebody said that, somebody did this, this is mediocre journalism. Haven't been briefed by my officers, I still don't know what is the news about."

Daniel Ortiz

"But sir, your officers could have fabricated their own reports to you to make sure that they actions seems above approach."

Mark Flowers

"So? Who said that the media did not fabricate as a report? Who is saying that they did not in fact, or who are saying that they did not fabricate the report?"

Fair enough, that's his response, but we stand by our story, and for the record, our news team did not, at all, fabricate that story. Neither did we embellish any of those details for sensationalism. We aired those comments as the interviewees described the events.

And what's his comment for the allegation coming from the residents of Lakeview Street also alst week? As we told you one resident claimed that one elderly resident was chanced by officers of the GSU who may have re-injured her shoulder on which had recently received surgery. He says that according his officers, that lady was trying to block them from finding a stash of buried weed:

Mark Flowers

"I've heard the report where an elderly woman was standing in an area that was suspected to have been freshly dug and something possibly buried there. She was asked to step aside and she refused saying that she was not going to go anywhere. She was physically removed and the item was dug up and they found a pound of compressed marijuana there. Now if the officers had reasons to believe she knew, she was standing concealing it, they would have arrested her. It is not their belief that she knew it, it could be that she knew, but they don't believe she knew that was there, so they treated it as found property. I don't see where that is wrong, if somebody is asked to step aside and you don't, you will physically be moved, I mean the officers are there to do a job and they did find a pound of compressed marijuana and that item was released in the news already. The things that people do, it's not like a go guide's unit, going out there and talking to people, often times it is difficult to ask somebody. If you know you are doing something illegal, the easiest thing to do, and this is becoming the culture now is to cry foul."

But, as we've told you, this is not the first time that the Units behaviour has been called into question. There have been many complaints in the past, but so far only 3 or 4 of them have been pursued in court against the unit. As we told you, in December of last year, the Government of Belize had to pay $175,000 compensation to residents of the George Street for excessive behaviour for a raid in August 2011. Then the National Security Ministry apologized to residents of Taylor's Alley in April 2012 for the unit's behaviour when they conducted a raid through that neighbourhood in 2012. Then there is businessman Miguel Menjivar in Belmopan who launched his own lawsuit against the Unit for the raid conducted on his house. In that pre-dawn raid, officers hopped his fence and breeched the property where over 100 bullets were unloaded on the house. Instead of those officers being made to answer for that conduct, Menjivar was charged with 9 counts of attempted murder because he fired against them think they were armed thieves. He ended up beating that case, and he's now in the process of suing the government and the police department.

Those were in the days of the founding commander, Marco Vidal, and today we asked Flowers about the new allegations of GSU excess in the context of those events before him. He told us that he is not going to offer any explanation for those days of the GSU when he was not in charge:

Daniel Ortiz

"While you weren't there are the unit commander, but this is still your unit."

Mark Flowers

"I can't defend something that I have no control over, and I had no control over this unit at that material time. I offer no defence, I won't even entertain that kind of discussions, they have a lot of things that has been said."

Daniel Ortiz

"But sir, while you won't discuss that, it goes to the perception, goes to the credibility, there were 2 instances. Ministry had to apologise for the behaviour, again that goes to the credibility that the unit does use excessive force from time to time."

Mark Flowers

"I'm saying that I've been assigned to this unit only recently. Judge this unit on it's present system administration success and performance. I can't answer, there was time when Christ walked on earth, I can't answer for then, he was crucified, he was a good man."

Daniel Ortiz

"But sir, don't you at any point in time have to help to quell the fears the public that your unit, that you now command is going to act in a certain fashion when they are out in operations? There is already that fear of the GSU, you know those guys there, you can't speak against them, they attack you, they do you any kind of thing you have to just take it."

Mark Flowers

"I've said that I will not superintend over any unit that practices any degrading, inhumane, illegal out of order performance. I will not sit by and watch what happen, no man, that will not happen. I'm saying to you, at the same token, that I cannot be held accountable for those yesteryears incident, I don't know about them, I was not here and I will account for the period I'm here."

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