There was a crazy chopping incident on the work bus that Belize City Council employees use to move around as they perform their sanitation duties.
That bus, which was parked at the corner of Cairo Street and Euphrates Avenue, was crowded with many eyewitnesses. But, that didn't stop 53 year-old sanitation worker Dennis Bodden from chopping his co-worker, 40 year-old Michael Tesecum, twice in the head.
When we arrived, we found the employees hysterical and frightened by what had unfolded right before their eyes. In fact, a few of them didn't know how they were spared, since they were right there when Bodden started swinging the machete.
We spoke to one co-worker who told us that he narrowly escaped being chopped in a dispute that he had nothing to do with:
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"They pick us up from Euphrates, me and the guy who got chopped. He and I were sitting down side by side. A young man jumped over the seat and he was drinking a bottle of water and it look like the young men knock over the bottle of water from his hand. But it seems that the two had long-time issues in the bus. The young man ask him what is he going to do about it, then he replied back with a machete and chop him across his head. The guy fell and the young man chopped him again. That was all I saw."
Reporter
"The victim and the man who had the machete, were they friends?"
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"We are work brothers; we work together. I don't understand what went on between two of them. It happened in front of the entire bus crew and the two supervisors."
Reporter
"It looks like all the employees are distresses by what they saw."
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"They are shocked because they didn't believe that would happen. All of us work together. We are like sisters and brothers."
Reporter
"These two guys how long have they been working with the City Council?"
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"Three years we have been working with the Belize City Council and it's the first time that this got out of hand like that."
Reporter
"All operations would probably be shutdown because of this?"
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"I guess so."
Reporter
"I see you have blood on your shirt, sir?"
Windel Russell, Eyewitness
"The man is my good friend. It was me that the guy was going to chop first. But I slip and it caught him in his head. He flung the machete like he is crazy and there was a lot of people in the bus."
As you saw in our story, Bodden was taken away by officers of the Mobile Interdiction Team; police say that he remains in police detention tonight.
Tesecum is in a critical condition at the KHMH.
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