Email

Print

Monica Bodden reporting
On Friday night GSU officers conducted a search here at this address on Rivero Street on the Southside of Belize City.

18 year old Shaquille Patnett was home at the time, inside the yard in one of the bungalow houses. He soon became another victim of police brutality.

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"I was sitting down in my chair and I heard the GSU outside and so I opened the door a little bit because the door was closed. I didn't want them to run in here and see me, like I was hiding them and so I opened the door. They ran inside and they ask who and I lives here and I told them only my mom and I."

Patnett was allegedly babysitting his 8 month old nephew when the officers barged inside his mother's house.

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"When they came inside and went by my mom's room door and they told me 'who told me to sit down.' I told them that I didn't want my nephew to fell from the chair."

Monica Bodden
"How old is your nephew?"

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"About 8 months old. I told them that I sat down because I didn't want my nephew to fell from the chair. When I got up I had my nephew in my hand and they whop me in my forehead and they burst it with the flashlight and so I put down my nephew, because I don't want my nephew to get hurt in my hand. When I put down my nephew, the officer punched me two times in my abdomen and in my chest. At the same time my mom came from the shop. They took me outside, choke me, and forced me on the ground with 3 of them knees in my back and handcuffed me. My mom told them that I was bleeding down there, because I lift up my face to let my mom see me and the my mom told them that I was bleeding. None of them didn't answer. All of them got me surrounded, so that none of my family could see me. One of them kick my foot and they see that I was not moving. So two of them went to talk outside, and two of them came in back and pull me and just took me in the pickup and my parents was asking them why were they taking me for and they didn't answer."

The teenager was taken to the KHMH and received stitches to his forehead.

Shaquille told us after he was done from the KHMH, he was taken to the GSU headquarters in Belize City and was given two options.

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"Three of them took me to the hospital and when I came out of the x-ray room, the one who knock me, I watch him in his face and he looks at me straight in my face too and the only thing he did was hang down his head and then after that then took me the big boss, to come and see me in the hospital, to talk to me."

Monica Bodden
"And what did he say?"

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"He ask me what did I want to do for the night, if I want them to take me home, or if I want to go to the station to get charged and I told him for what. When I ask him for what, the other one came and told me to just leave it."

Monica Bodden
"Charged for what? They found anything on you? They found anything inside the yard? What were they going to charged you for? Did they say what they were going to charged you for?"

Shaquille Patnett - Alleging police brutality
"They didn't tell me anything. They just told me that I will get charged for assaulting the officer and I didn't assault any officer."

Like many others, Shaquille Patnett was released from police custody without a charge. The teenager has no previous police record or any run-ins with the law. It was his first time in police custody. Today he is still in pain from his head and body injuries. The swelling on his chest was still visible.

Rose Sutherland - Mother of Patnett
"I reached at the hospital, the high man was there, and two of them was with my son. They already took him to the x-ray office. So, I talk to them and I told him that I don't know why they beat my son, because only my son was in the place, but he was like beating around the bush, like he didn't want any problem. Then he looked at me and told me that they could take him in and charged him. I say charge him for what? You didn't meet him doing anything. I said that you al will charge for holding the baby, he had his nephew in his hand. He says that they could send him home - it sounds like he didn't want anything to happen with it. I told them that I rather my baby go home, because I don't want them to take him to the station and when he is there, something happens to him. So, I rather you all to give him to me so I can take him home."

Monica Bodden
"Did he mentioned what they would charge him for?"

Rose Sutherland - Mother of Patnett
"No. Nothing like that. I ask what they would charge him for and then they agrees to bring us home, me and my son."

And there are many other police brutality allegations against officers of the Gang Suppression Unit that have made the news - In September of 2014 we reported on the incident of Kariq Tzul - a King Street resident who was allegedly beaten up and kicked so hard in his abdomen by GSU officers - that he soiled himself.

The commander of the GSU, Inspector Mark Flowers today told us that he has been in san Pedro for the past two weeks. He said he is not familiar with the victim - but had received a call about the beatdown - and advised the woman who called him to go make a police complaint.