Nearly seven years after 83-year-old local resident Cletus “Banana Split” Hippolyte disappeared without a trace from his Gros Islet home in September 2019, Saint Lucian law enforcement has formally brought a murder charge against a suspect in the long-cold case. The Royal Saint Lucia Police Force (RSLPF) confirmed the development in an official public statement released on a recent Friday, marking a major breakthrough in an investigation that had gone dormant for years after initial extensive search efforts failed to turn up any clues to Hippolyte’s whereabouts. The accused, identified as Kiril Didier, was taken into custody during a carefully planned targeted police operation on Tuesday, November 3, before being required to participate in a formal identification parade the following day. Authorities formally served Didier with the murder charge on Thursday, November 5, and he is now scheduled to appear in court for an upcoming bail hearing as the legal process moves forward. The RSLPF noted that the long-stalled Hippolyte disappearance probe was recently reopened by the force’s specialized Gangs, Narcotics and Firearms Unit (GNFU), after investigators uncovered previously unexamined new leads related to the decades-old missing person case. At this stage, law enforcement officials have chosen not to release specific details about the newly uncovered leads or the full body of evidence that led them to file the murder charge against Didier, citing the need to protect the integrity of the ongoing active investigation. To date, no trace of Hippolyte has been recovered, and his current location remains entirely unknown nearly seven full years after he was last seen at his Gros Islet residence. In light of the unresolved gaps in the case, the RSLPF has issued a public appeal urging any members of the public who may hold unshared information, no matter how seemingly insignificant, that could help advance the probe to reach out immediately to their nearest local police station to provide testimony.