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Today, a wide cross section of Belizean society is still trying to figure out what could have led prominent attorney Michael Young to commit suicide.  What we know so far is that the 61 year old Young left his office at Young’s Law Firm at around 11:00, went to buy lunch from his usual place, ate lunch with his wife at their Bella Vista home, and then retired to his bedroom at 12:45.  At around 1:00, his wife found him dead in the bathroom. The door had been locked and he was found inside with a gunshot to the left side of the temple, and beside his body lay a black and silver Ruger 9 mm pistol loaded with (1) one live round in the chamber and (14) live rounds inside the magazine. One 9mm expended shell was found inside the bathtub.

Today his long time and close personal friend Rodwell Williams discussed with us the circumstances leading to his Young’s apparent suicide.  He says his friend had been ill:

Rodwell Williams - SC - Michael's Friend
"You're so close that you should see things for what they are byt yet you're so close that perhaps you miss things for what they are. Yes we know Mike has been ill, you know he had that challenge with cancer which he had overcome and so on and he had return of dengue, he faced that and it left him with a residual kind of bronchial kind of cough which he have found it challenging to shake and we know he's an indefatigable worker (laugh)... That man is known to put in hours, he goes to the office at 5 and 6 in the morning, do a job of work then staff come in 8 o'clock like we know he was terribly tired, complained about being tired, over worked kind of thing. We know that burnt our kind of thing needed medication to rest but he was clearly ill in that sense and kept being dismissive, you know man I will take care of it rather than trying to put his health first."

"Certain I can say to you that leading up to Tuesday and Tuesday morning those at his office; again you know he's ill but those at the office were experiencing a kind of deterioration in terms of how he operates and so on and in fact why you no go home go rest, why you no go home go rest kind of thing but in a way to observe that look the boss no the feel too well obviously and we know he's ill and so on but he the burn the midnight oil too; he's and indefatigable worker so they just kind of encourage him to go, he was to go to Belmopan Tuesday and was discouraged, no why you no go home and rest and so. And he left to go for lunch, buy his lunch and took it home and everything, you know he didn't quite buy a lot of lunch like if he will have a party, took it home and things evolve as they did so. We know, we see, we know he's ill but beatable kind of illness and then this whole tiredness. I am not going to put a clinical definition of what but the word depression and sleeplessness but tired at the same time you know."

Later on we’ll have much more on the legacy of Michael Young as fellow Senior Counsels Denys Barrow and Godfrey Smith comment on his public life as a lawyer and social activist.