Last night our headline was about a sensational document - supposedly from the US Department of Homeland Security - which listed over 50 police officers who have been placed on a watchlist.
Yesterday - a source only showed us the list on a portable device - and gave us a few minutes to review it. Well tonight, we have the original Word document in our possession - and we can tell you that it is BOGUS.
That's right - the document appears to be a case of quite creative mischief. It has none of the elements of an official document - no signature, date or seal. And, because it is an open document, it can be manipulated to delete the Homeland Security logo header, or add any name you please. Definitely not official, and definitely very suspect.
The US Embassy today told us, quote, "These allegations are baseless and the Embassy has no knowledge of such a document. The United States and Belize share a strong partnership and will continue to collaborate on initiatives to strengthen our bilateral relations and enhance citizen security in Belize and the region." That's pretty much the same thing the CEO in the Ministry of Home Affairs told us yesterday - when we quoted him as saying that the document is not real.
And while this kind of mischief hardly merits analysis, from the looks of it, we would say it was generated within the police department by someone seeking to impugn the credibility of a wide cross section of officers.
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