On a quiet Sunday morning in Belize City, the crack of gunshots shattered the calm just after 1 a.m., leaving a tragic outcome that has rocked the local community. Hours after residents reported the gunfire, law enforcement officers made a grim discovery: 23-year-old Christopher Smith Jr. lay dead from multiple gunshot wounds on Arlington Drive, his life cut short in a killing that investigators are now racing to solve.
Assistant Superintendent of Police Stacy Smith, staff officer for the department, outlined the details of the investigation in a statement to local media. “At approximately 7 a.m., police control received word that Smith’s body had been located on Arlington Drive,” she explained. “Responding investigators found an unresponsive body with clear gunshot injuries, and several spent bullet casings were recovered at the scene. Witness accounts place the shooting around 1:20 a.m., matching earlier reports of gunfire in the area, but first responding units were unable to secure the crime scene immediately after the shots were reported. The department has pulled surveillance footage from the crime fusion center, which has generated promising leads that investigators are actively following up on right now.”
Smith’s killing comes just months after a high-profile criminal case against him came to an abrupt end. In 2024, Smith was arrested and charged alongside two other men in connection with the double murder of cousins Marvin Cante and Juan Raymundo, whose remains were discovered in a shallow grave outside the village of Hattieville. But in a surprising turn last November, the Director of Public Prosecutions ordered all charges against Smith be withdrawn, and he was released from custody.
For his family, the young man who was killed was ready to turn his back on a troubled past and build a new, honest life. His grandmother, who raised Smith until he was five years old and remained a close part of his life into adulthood, shared that he had explicitly told her he planned to change his ways. “He told me that he was going to change his life. He said, ‘Grandma, I’m not living that life anymore. I’m going to get a job and do the right thing,’” she recalled. “I told him okay, son. His uncle was going to give him a job working as a baker, so he could earn an honest living.”
She remembered her grandson as a loving, helpful young man who frequently checked in on her. “Every time he came to visit, he’d say ‘grandma I love you so much. Granny you know how much I love you granny,’” she said. “I’d tell him yes grandson I love you too. Oh he’s always helpful. Always willing to do whatever I needed done. If I had fish to scale, he’d do it right away without being asked. That was just who he was.”
Smith was the son of a serving police officer, a detail that adds another layer of interest to the ongoing investigation. While he had prior interactions with law enforcement, investigators have not yet drawn a definitive connection between his killing and the 2024 double murder case he was connected to. Police stress that all possible motives are currently on the table as they work to identify and apprehend the shooter. “We have not been able to establish any confirmed motive,” ASP Smith noted. “This remains an active, ongoing investigation.”
Smith’s two former co-defendants in the 2024 double murder case are still scheduled to go to trial this coming October, as the Belize City Police Department continues its work to unravel the circumstances of Smith’s death. This report was prepared by Britney Gordon for News Five.