7 News Belize

Cops Shoot Teenager In City
posted (October 27, 2010)
A 16 year old was shot this morning in Belize City. It happened at around 6:15 in the area of Moya and Berry street in Lake Independence.

The talking around the neighborhood was that he teenager was fleeing from a burglary.

Monica Bodden went looking for answer this morning:

16 year old Jaron Grey - a student at Belize Youth Cadet Corp - was seen here on Berry Street around 7 this morning - lying on his back with a gunshot wound to his knee.

He wasn't shot by just anyone - in fact he was shot by police. Today his mother told us - that officer who was doing the shooting - was simply trigger happy this morning.

Sharlet Grey, Mother of Minor
"This morning my son and my boyfriend get up. My boyfriend had a chopping of a yard job to go do so he say that he will take my son with him to check on the job. 2 of them left the house while I was sitting in the chair. I heard gunshots so I already know that my boyfriend is a target so I come outside, When I come outside I see a police coming towards me firing shots so I ask him why is he firing shots for? He wasn't listening to me, he was just shooting his gun. So I walk cross the street to come by the neighbor house. When I reach on the other side I see my son coming out of the yard and the police telling him to get down on the ground so my son got down on the ground. I was conscious that he got shot, so I start to walk to my son and the police tell me to draw back miss and I told him that that is my son and he is underage. He told me to draw back and that he will not give me any information. I told him that I wasn't moving from there because this is my son and so when I look down at my son I see him bleeding and I ask him if he got shot and he said yes they shot him in his foot. I told him to turnover so that I could see, The police told me to draw back and I stand there crying the my father came and start to quarrel with the police. The officer took shame and hang down his head and so I went to my son and touch him but the other officer didn't want him to get up."

Grey says her boyfriend - who was along with her son - was just hanging out at this abandon house - which is only a block away from where they live.

Sharlet Grey, Mother of Minor
"He said that they were just sitting on the verandah and that he told my son to see what is going on in the house. While they were walking in the house they heard a police vehicle and he told my son that that was the police so they start to run. It looks like he run faster than my son. My son is not a criminal so he will not run. So he walks outside when they shot him."

Monica Bodden "He jump the fence to reach to your yard."

Sharlet Grey, Mother of Minor
"To reach for our house over the next side when they shot him."

This morning when she went to the police station she was told that her 16 year old son will be charged with burglary. For this mother - that charge is pure nonsense - since the house is abandon and completely empty.

Sharlet Grey, Mother of Minor
"Well they only tell me that they will charge him for burglary. But I dint see how they can charge him for that because this is an abandoned building that everybody comes in o smoke weed, it is wide open, there is nothing in the house."

The Police Press Officer was - to no one's surprise - unavailable for comment.

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