7 News Belize

Political Friction Leads to Fight In Cayo
posted (February 2, 2018)
It seems the municipal election fever has political operatives a little hot-blooded - 18 year old PUP supporter Michael Lemus claims San Ignacio UDP Mayor Earl Trapp and his councilors beat him up pretty badly yesterday evening. Lemus' account is that at 6:15 he and a relative drove past Trapp and his team on their campaign trail. According to Lemus, he proclaimed his support for the PUP and Trapp and his team dragged him out of the vehicle and beat him up. Here is a phone interview with Lemus' mother.

Voice of: Aranelly Lemus, mother
"What he told me was that Trapp and the councilors attacked him."

Reporter
"Did he say why they attacked him, if this is the case?"

Voice of: Aranelly Lemus, mother
"He told me he shouted 'PUP got my back, they will win', and right there the problem started."

Reporter
"So Trapp and his team were campaigning in the area when your son saw them and he shouted 'PUP has his back'. After he shouted that, what happened after that? Did they run after the vehicle, if he was inside the vehicle, he could have just drove off?"

Voice of: Aranelly Lemus, mother
"He told me that he was inside the vehicle when, actually they hit piece of the car and one person whose name is "Lingus" jumped on top of him. Right there they said that Mr. Trapp kicked him up. When I arrived there I saw my son had blood on his mouth, he had a bruise around his eye and on his cheek and on by his eyebrow."

Well, Trapp says Lemus' report couldn't be farther from the truth. In a phone interview with Mayor Trapp he says there wasn't even any interaction between him and Lemus. The confrontation was between Lemus and a traffic officer.

Voice of: Earl Trapp, San Ignacio Mayor
"First of all I want to dispel everything that he has said here because it is totally false allegations. These are the non-sense that some people do and they create problems and behave as though they are the victims. I can tell you that we were indeed campaigning in the Cahal Pech area yesterday and just before we retired about 6pm in the evening, a car stopped about 20ft away from us. Upon stopping I observed that this was Hispanic male young person who opened the back passenger door, came out with what appeared to be a Belkin pint in his hands. He began to hurl insults and threatening words at us. I did not answer, my wife held me back and said to me 'babe don't say anything juts leave them alone'. Immediately I took the phone out of my pocket and called the police; the guys drove off. While they drove off, I'm talking to the police when they said they would be there shortly. They took a little over 10 minutes. Before the police arrived on scene, the guys returned. When they returned, there was a traffic officer beside me. He arrived just when they had left and I explained to him what had transpired. When they arrived on the scene again about 10 minutes later, I told him that is the car and the license plate B0906. So what he did was he approached the driver and asked for his driver's license. That's when the guy in the back that is claiming to be the victim, shoved a machete through the window at the traffic officer."

Reporter
"So based on what you're saying, you weren't involved at all in that situation."

Voice of: Earl Trapp, San Ignacio Mayor
"No, as a matter of fact he was there hurling different things and I never uttered a word while he was mentioning any stupidity there."

Reporter
"Okay so you never answered him, you didn't aggress him, there was no confrontation whatsoever between you and this young man."

Voice of: Earl Trapp, San Ignacio Mayor
"No the closest I got was when the machete fell out of his hand. That was when I moved across from the street where I was, because this 2nd time he stopped 12 feet away from us. That's when I held the machete until the police arrived. At this moment, I am still awaiting legal advice as to determine whether or not this case can be liable for defame of character. I can tell you that indeed I did not do anything wrong. These people maliciously put this on their Facebook page to try and gain political mileage."

According to Lemus' mom, her son is detained at the police station. 7news has confirmed that Michael Lemus was charged with two counts of threatening words and one count of aggravated assault. Lemus did not make any complaint. Police believe that he was intoxicated - and they also found him with a machete.

The official police report says that Trapp and others were on the campaign trail when a taxi stopped nearby and Lemus started cursing them. A traffic warden went to the car and that's when Lemus allegedly pulled out a machete and put it to the traffic warden face and threatened him. That's when police arrived and detained Lemus.

Mayor Trapp says he has made a formal report at the police station. He will seek legal advice on how to proceed with this matter.

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