Last night, we showed you that video surveillance of police officers from the Special Assignment Team beating down on a Belize City man who had already surrendered.
He's 20 year-old Randy Chambers, a resident of Police Street, and on Sunday morning, he was strung up by the police officers after going to the corner shop. Reports are that Chambers had an altercation with a group of young men who live nearby. We are told that they don't get along because Police Street is the home to residents who live in two separate gang territories.
So, they had their skirmish, but Chambers left because he saw the police approaching. He got home, but those same officers followed him. What unfolded afterwards is what was caught on surveillance camera, and today, we got a chance to speak with Chambers, minutes after he was released from police custody. They held him for 48 hours and released him without charges. Daniel Ortiz caught up with him today, and he has that story:
Daniel Ortiz reporting
The video footage starts with 20 year-old Randy Chambers walking toward the police officers. He puts his hands behind his head, surrendering to the authority of the 3 armed police officers seen in the frame.
He turns around, clearly following the instructions, but somehow that's not enough for the 3 officers. 1 of them runs up to him and grabs him around the neck. Another of the officers also gets near enough to Chambers, and they both work to throw him on the ground.
Once he's at their mercy, each of the officers makes sure to give him a stomp to the midsection.
They keep him there for about 30 more seconds, and it appears that the officers take few more kicks at him. At some parts of the surveillance footage, it appears that the officers have their boot on Chambers, keeping him subdued, but it is unclear why still have him on the ground.
Eventually they pick him up, and it appears that he may have spoken to each other. Just before he is removed from his family's yard, he is made to stand up, and that's one fires another kick, hitting him in what looks to be the leg or lower abdomen.
The other officers then remove him from the camera's field of view.
Chambers told us that this all started because he had a quarrel from one of the youths which live nearby.
Randy Chambers - Brutalized by police
"When I reach back across my house I see the police ran up on me and told me to stop and so I stop and I put up my hand on my head. They told me to turn around and so I did. When I turned around, one of them grabbed me and start to choke me and threw me on the ground and started to kick me and stomp me in my face, my belly and my back and when they are done they ask me where the gun was, so I ask them what gun. They had just left from my yard early in the morning and they took my picture. I told them if I had any gun why would I pulled it on anybody? So they pick me up and took me to the station and they say that they will charge me for assault with a firearm. They say that I pulled gun on 2 young men."
"When I reach at the shop while buying I saw a guy came out of the car and showed me a gun sign and so when I see him I told him not to show me gun sign and so I went home. I came back out to buy again and I met my cousin on the lane. I was talking to my cousin and his bigger brother came in the vehicle and meet me on the lane and ran into me. I came off my bike and sit down my bike and me and my cousin came off our bikes. When he saw that he started to run and so I chased him. He went home for a big machete and that's when I saw the police coming."
Police detained him from Sunday until this morning, before midday, when they released him with any charges. He says he will be pressing charges against these officers.
Randy Chambers - Brutalized by police
"I like it that I am camera. They did all the knocking."
Daniel Ortiz
"Do you intend to take action against them for what they put you through?"
Randy Chambers - Brutalized by police
"I already made court action on them already. I already have my papers to have them deal with that. I am just waiting to take the paper in and have them start to deal with that."
Daniel Ortiz
"Have you encountered them before?"
Randy Chambers - Brutalized by police
"They always come at our house to look for gun, but I just came from prison in October and from them they didn't come here until yesterday."
Chambers tell us that the officers wanted to charge him with aggravated assault. You heard him say in our interview that the cops were accusing him of pulling a gun on the men he had the disagreement with. Chambers said that the officers withdrew the charge against him on the advice of a ranking police officer.
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