分类： society

Almost a full week after 17-year-old Alwin Marin Jr. left his Belize City home for a planned fishing trip with a friend, what began as a frantic search for a missing teen ended in unspeakable tragedy on April 16, 2026. Marin’s decomposing body was discovered by his own mother, Patricia Cardinez, in the isolated, bush-covered Dykes area of Belize City, confirming the worst fear she had carried since her son’s disappearance.

Marin was last seen leaving his Jane Usher Boulevard neighborhood alongside 17-year-old Jaheil Westby. When neither teen returned home after four days, their families filed missing person reports with local authorities. Westby’s bullet-riddled body was recovered in the same region last Friday, launching an immediate, widespread search for Marin that Cardinez never paused, even amid widespread speculation that Marin may have been involved in Westby’s death.

In an interview with News Five reporter Isani Cayetano, Cardinez described her relentless search through dense, remote brush that ended with the devastating find she had dreaded. “I feel good that I find my son, that I searched. I search eena di bush. I sih jankro, and I search til I find my son,” Cardinez said, speaking in Belizean Kriol. “I hurt fi know that I find my son way da back yah soh cause my son da wah lee bwai weh usually goh and cohn home back. But, at the same time, too, how my son dead now, soh who kill my son?”

Like Westby, Alwin died a violent death far from his neighborhood, leading senior law enforcement officials to conclude the two killings are connected. ACP Hilberto Romero, head of Belize’s National Crime Investigation Branch, confirmed that investigators have been tracking the linked case from the day Westby’s body was recovered. “The body has been retrieved and taken to the forensic laboratory where it awaits a post mortem examination,” Romero told reporters. “This report was made from last week Friday and from then searches were being conducted in the area and the body of Jaheil Westby was found on Friday. They were together, so it’s case we were following up on from the day.”

Romero added that evidence at the two discovery sites indicates the teens fled their attacker in separate directions, explaining why Marin’s body was found much farther from Westby’s. This new observation has forced investigators to discard earlier theories that suggested Marin was involved in Westby’s killing—a conclusion Cardinez pushed back on forcefully even before her son’s body was found.

“Di policeman dehn weh gaan da my house and di search fi my son, how I wah di hide my son when I still yet deh pan di news and still yet di search fi my son. Now I find my son now, soh who kill my son?” Cardinez said.

Cardinez alleges the double murder is tied to a long-simmering public nuisance that has increasingly turned violent across Belize: stolen and stray horses. She says the two teens were together on a horse when they were attacked, a motive that aligns with growing community frustration over the persistent problem of unauthorized horse grazing and horse theft in the area.

Now that both bodies have been recovered, investigators are reworking their case strategy to pursue new leads tied to the possible horse-related motive, as they work to identify and arrest those responsible for the killings. Cardinez has called for immediate action from authorities, urging police to hold all involved in her son’s killing accountable.

Nearly three years from now, in 2026, Belize has officially launched the development process of a refreshed National Youth Development Policy and Strategy, a framework designed to more accurately align with the evolving daily realities, long-term aspirations, and pressing challenges that shape the lives of the country’s young population.

To kick off this multi-stage policy drafting process, 17 stakeholders drawn from four key groups — government bodies, domestic civil society organizations, grassroots youth collectives, and international cooperating partners — gathered in Belize City for the first ever Youth Policy Round Table. This round table has been tasked with guiding and overseeing every step of the policy development effort to ensure accountability and inclusive direction.

The entire initiative is being led by Belize’s Ministry of Tourism, Youth, Sports and Diaspora Relations, with Nicole Usher-Solano, the Chief Executive Officer of the ministry, serving as chair of the inaugural round table. To ground the policy in rigorous, context-specific research, the ministry has contracted the University of Belize’s Policy Research Institute (BELPRI) to coordinate all drafting work, with technical and financial backing from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

A research team led by BELPRI Executive Director Dr. Dylan Vernon will carry out a full suite of outreach and data collection activities: from comprehensive background research and national public surveys to one-on-one stakeholder interviews and regional consultation workshops across every district of Belize. The core purpose of this broad engagement strategy is to ensure that the perspectives, needs and priorities of young Belizeans directly shape the final policy framework, rather than the document being designed exclusively by adult policymakers in closed sessions.

Organizers behind the initiative have emphasized that the end goal is not a superficial, ceremonial policy document. Instead, they aim to deliver a practical, forward-looking roadmap that expands accessible opportunities for Belizean young people to pursue education, build meaningful careers, take on leadership roles in their communities, and contribute tangibly to the country’s long-term national development goals.

A threatened total shutdown of bus services across Belize scheduled for this coming Monday will not go ahead as planned, at least temporarily, following a negotiating session held earlier this morning between leaders of the Belize Bus Association (BBA) and senior officials from the country’s Ministry of Transport. The last-minute negotiations have averted immediate disruption to commuters, freight services and daily economic activity across the nation, but the fundamental disagreement that pushed private bus operators to plan industrial action remains unresolved, pending a final decision from Belize’s Cabinet and Transport Minister Dr Luis Zabaneh.

In an exclusive interview with News 5 immediately after the meeting concluded, BBA President Phillip Jones confirmed that while hours of discussion were held between the two sides, no agreement was reached. The core sticking point centers on a longstanding demand from private bus operators for a rate adjustment that would align their pricing with that of the state-run National Bus Company. Currently, private operators face a five-cent-per-mile gap in allowed rates that they argue has created an unsustainable financial strain, threatening the long-term survival of many small, independent private bus operations across the country.

Prior to this week’s negotiations, Belize’s government had publicly stated that the operators’ demand for rate alignment was “off the table”, a position that left private operators with no option but to threaten a full service shutdown. Despite the lack of a final resolution, Jones confirmed that private bus operators have agreed to continue running all scheduled services on Monday and Tuesday in a show of good faith, while Cabinet deliberates on the request. Operators are now waiting in expectation of an official response from the government body following its upcoming scheduled meeting, with the threat of a strike still looming if their demands are rejected.

Against the backdrop of annual Atlantic hurricane season preparations, a unique team of daredevil aviation specialists known as the Hurricane Hunters has touched down in Belize, bringing one-of-a-kind storm-tracking aircraft as a key stop on the 2026 Caribbean Hurricane Awareness Tour.

Jordan Mentzer, an experienced pilot with the Hurricane Hunters, explained that the tour blends three core goals: raising public knowledge of hurricane risks, strengthening regional preparedness, and engaging local stakeholders while opening the specialized aircraft to public tours. For the teams that regularly fly directly into the core of active hurricanes, the outreach mission is just as important as the data collection work they carry out during storm season.

Unlike satellite observation, which can only track storm systems from space, these reinforced aircraft fly directly into the heart of hurricanes to gather hard-to-access atmospheric measurements that satellites cannot capture. The real-time data they collect is fed directly into forecasting models used by every national meteorological service across the Caribbean, helping forecasters refine predictions of storm track, strength and landfall timing.

Having flown these dangerous missions for decades, Mentzer noted that the team has built up decades of knowledge to operate as safely as possible in the extreme conditions of a hurricane. “We have learned which maneuvers work, what hazards to avoid, and how to navigate storm systems with the highest possible level of safety we can achieve,” he said.

Robbie Berg, a warning coordinator meteorologist at the U.S. National Hurricane Center, emphasized that the in-storm data collected by the Hurricane Hunters is irreplaceable for life-saving forecasting. “Having these aircraft is absolutely critical to our work,” Berg explained. “They deliver observations directly from the center of the storm, so we can pin down exactly how strong the hurricane is, where it is positioned, and what its central barometric pressure is. That detail is what allows us to produce far more accurate forecasts that help communities prepare and evacuate on time.”

During the Belize stop, local government officials and dozens of students got a rare, close-up look inside the converted aircraft, which doubles as a flying atmospheric research laboratory. Henry Charles Usher, Belize’s Minister of Public Service and Disaster Risk Management, highlighted that including Belize in this year’s tour carries long-term meaning beyond immediate preparedness. He noted that initiatives like this can spark interest in STEM and emergency management careers, helping cultivate “the next generation of Belizean scientists, pilots, meteorologists, and engineers” who will lead the country’s climate and disaster resilience efforts in the coming decades.

Local outlet News Five has announced it will air a full, in-depth walkthrough of the Hurricane Hunters’ aircraft during its 6 p.m. newscast tonight, inviting audiences to tune in for a closer look at the unique mission.

Belize’s public transit network is on the brink of a total shutdown, with industry leaders warning that thousands of buses could be pulled from roads across the country as early as next Monday if the national government does not address urgent industry demands. The Belize Bus Association (BBA), the group representing the majority of bus operators nationwide, has issued a formal ultimatum that hinges on immediate government intervention to resolve a growing financial crisis driven by skyrocketing fuel costs.

BBA President Philip Jones laid out the dire financial reality facing operators in a press statement, explaining that relentless increases in diesel prices have flipped daily operations from marginal profit to consistent loss for most service providers. Independent small-scale operators, who make up a large portion of Belize’s bus network, confirm that fuel costs now consume the single largest share of their monthly operating revenue, leaving little to no room for vehicle maintenance, insurance, or driver wages.

To ease the financial strain, the BBA has put forward three potential policy solutions to the government: temporary fuel tax relief, targeted operating subsidies for small operators, and a controlled adjustment to passenger fares. As of press time, none of these proposals have received official approval from government bodies, and no formal negotiations have been scheduled to address the association’s concerns.

Jones emphasized that operators have no desire to disrupt public service or inconvenience commuters. “We don’t want to strike. We don’t want to discontinue service,” he stated, doubling down on a call for Belize’s Minister of Transport to meet directly with operator representatives to find a mutually acceptable solution. Still, he warned that without urgent action, the country will face a systemic disruption he has dubbed “busgeddon” – a shutdown far more disruptive to daily life than many commuters and officials currently anticipate.

If the BBA follows through on its threat, the impact will be felt immediately by tens of thousands of commuters across Belize, from daily work travelers to students and families relying on affordable public transit to access essential services. With less than a week remaining before the proposed shutdown date, both government and industry stakeholders are facing growing pressure to reach a last-minute compromise.

Local outlet News 5 plans to air a full in-depth report on the unfolding crisis, including detailed breakdown of operating cost data and interviews with representatives from both the BBA and government transport officials, during its 6 p.m. News 5 Live broadcast tonight.