BELMOPAN, Belize, CMC – A Belize City Magistrate Court has sentenced a police officer to two years in jail after he was found guilty of sexually assaulting a teenager.
Police officer Melvin Canul, 27, was not represented at his court hearing where he was accused of squeezing the buttocks of a 17-year-old girl in September 2023.
The teenager told the court that on September 12, she was at a police booth, returning a flag she had borrowed from a cadet instructor.
She said while folding the flag, a Hispanic officer whom she did not know passed by and squeezed her on the left side of her buttocks. When she turned around, she observed a policeman standing behind her.
Canul was subsequently arraigned and pleaded not guilty to the charge of sexual assault and was released on BDZ$3,000 (One Belize dollar=US$0.49 cents) bail.
But when he appeared before Chief Magistrate Jayani Wegodapola, he was found guilty of the charge and sentenced to two years.
and then 