The May 25th, 2014 issue of The STAR (Cayo) is online HERE

This Week's Stories:

  • Aaron Juan Remanded On Another Sex Related Charge:
    Having been on the run for over five months, a businessman from San Ignacio Town accompanied by an attorney, today turned himself in to the police to be charged. San Ignacio police reports that around midmorning on Tuesday, May 20, Aaron Elijah Juan, 33, Belizean businessman of a Burns Avenue address in San Ignacio Town, accompanied by Belize City based attorney, Richard "Dickie" Bradley, walked into the police station in effect turning in himself to face a carnal knowledge charge.
  • Five Guatemalans On A Drug Trafficking Charge:
    Five Guatemalans, one of which is a naturalized Belizean, were found in a car on the George Price Highway with 18 pounds of marijuana suspected to be of Guatemalan origin. San Ignacio police reports that the Guatemalans were moving the sack of weed during the wee hours of the morning on Tuesday, May 20. The report indicated that at around 3:00 am, a joint operation mounted by elements of the police Anti Drug Unit (ADU), police Mobile Interdiction Unit (MIT), police K-9 Unit and Customs personnel were manning a checkpoint on the George Price Highway between the western towns of San Ignacio and Benque Viejo, at mile 68, near Rumors Resort, when a green Geo Prism car with San Ignacio/Satna Elena license plates C-01281, pulled up to the check point. The car, with five occupants including the driver, was stopped and searched. Inside the trunk of the car police came upon a white sack and when opened, it was found to contain two black plastic bags with 11 parcels of marijuana.
  • Belize City Man Guilty Of San Ignacio Theft:
    A man who told the police that the lives on Antelope Street in Belize City today pled guilty of a theft charge after he was caught by an alert off duty policemen a few minutes after snatching a lady's sling bag. The incident occurred at around 6:00 am on Sunday May 18 when a hardworking vegetable vendor from Santa Familia village, Cayo was sitting under the Falcon Field bus stop waiting for the bus to travel on business to Belize City. The lady told the police that after sitting under the bus stop for about 15 minutes a tall male person of fair complexion, wearing a black � Jeans pant, a black "Los Angeles" baseball cap and a black T-Shirt, arrived at the bus stop. She heard when the man said that he had lost his telephone. He walked to the back of the shed as if searching for something and this was when he grabbed the lady's black sling bag she had on her lap and ran off.
  • Guatemalan Ex-President Alfonso Portillo Jailed In US:
    A court in New York has sentenced former Guatemalan President Alfonso Portillo to five years and 10 months in jail for taking bribes from Taiwan. Portillo, who was extradited to the United States last year, has also been ordered to pay a $2.5m fine. He pleaded guilty in March to attempting to launder the illegal money through American banks. The judge has not decided whether he will serve the remainder of his sentence in the US or Guatemala. Portillo has already spent a substantial amount of time in jail and has only another 18 months of his sentence to serve. The time in jail was "a big learning experience for me but also great pain for my family", Portillo said in court.
  • Secret Passages-An Art Show Opening At The Soul Project:
    This new exhibit features works of collage by people from all over the world visiting Belize. Collage is a very interesting medium. In collage, the artist assembles existing print material into a new format, a new picture. The artist creates a new context for the text or images selected, as they appear in the collage in relationship to one another. The seeming randomness of the selection and reassembly leaves a lot of room for subconscious free association by the artist, but also by the viewer. Collage invites us to link images together in an instantaneous impression, the first look. Our minds scan for patterns and similarities and differences, in an instant we form an idea about what we see. See Secret Passages for yourself, and let your mind expand...showing until etc date at Soul Project in San Ignacio.
  • Cholesterol:
    To understand high blood cholesterol (ko-LES-ter-ol), it helps to learn about cholesterol. Cholesterol is a waxy, fat-like substance that's found in all cells of the body. Your body needs some cholesterol to make hormones, vitamin D, and substances that help you digest foods. Your body makes all the cholesterol it needs. However, cholesterol also is found in some of the foods you eat. Cholesterol travels through your bloodstream in small packages called lipoproteins (lip-o-PRO-teens). These packages are made of fat (lipid) on the inside and proteins on the outside. Two kinds of lipoproteins carry cholesterol through -out your body: low-density lipoproteins (LDL) and high- density lipoproteins (HDL). Having healthy levels of both types of lipoproteins is important.
  • What Is Commonwealth Or Sovereign's Day?:
    Commonwealth or Sovereign's Day, as it is known to us today, is the annual celebration of the Commonwealth of Nations an inter-governmental organization of 54 independent or sovereign states. The origin of this day came about in 1884 when Lord Rosebery, while visiting Australia (then under British governance), observed the changes in the British Empire. His observation was that some of its colonies were becoming increasingly independent. He was the first to address this issue and the first to refer to the states as the "Commonwealth of Nations" while still under the British rule. His observation lead to the first consultation between Britain and its colonies to address this emerging need for independence. It was not until 1931, however, that the first 5 colonies became recognized as the "British Commonwealth of Nations". These nations included Canada, the United Kingdom, Irish Free State, Newfoundland, and the Union of South Africa. In 1946, the 'British' was dropped from the name and the member states became known officially as the Commonwealth of Nations or simply The Commonwealth. Over the years, members joined, withdrew from, and even rejoined the Commonwealth; but it wasn't until 1949 that the international organization became the modern Commonwealth we know today. In 1952, Queen Elizabeth took her place as the Head of the Commonwealth of Nations after the death of her father King George IV.
  • Closing Days Of The Embassy of Mexico:
    The Mexican Embassy's offices in Belmopan, Belize City and Corozal will suspend activities on Monday, 26 May 2014. In case of emergency, Mexican nationals can request consular assistance or protection at the telephone number: + (501) 602- 8677. Belizeans are reminded that they do not require visa to visit Mexico. They only need to present a valid Belizean passport and fill out the immigration form called "Forma Migratoria M�ltiple" (FMM). It can be obtained at any Mexican border or at any airport.
  • VA Hospital Officials Shredded Documents To Hide Existence Of Secret Waiting Lists That Killed U.S. Veterans:
    The horrific Veterans Administration scandal, in which scores of patients on a "secret list" reportedly died after spending as long as a year without treatment, has widened. CNN correspondent Jake Tapper recently grilled White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough over President Obama's usual scandal posture: indifference, holding no one accountable and calculated outrage without any real action being taken. As noted by Breitbart News, Obama is currently standing by his secretary of Veterans Affairs, former Army Gen. Eric Shinseki. This is in spite of the fact that, in 2013, Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., the chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, sent the president a letter that, Tapper reported, warned "of dramatic problems at the VA, 'a perfect illustration of the management failures, deception, lack of accountability permeating VA's health care system [and] an alarming pattern of serious and significant patient care issues.'" 'But you are not. This letter was sent a year ago.'
  • Impoved Water Services:
    The Belize Water Service Limited is proud to announce the upgrading of water services to customers in the lower section of Santa Elena Town and the entire Esperanza Village. The upgraded service includes the recent replacement of the three inch water line upgraded to a ten inch main which will serve to increase water pressure to customers in the area. The project, implemented over the past three weeks, with a crew under the direction of William Stevens and Operations Supervisor, Ron Cunningham, worked long hours to install, sanitize, pressure test and energize the new 10 inch water main. The works was completed on Tuesday evening and when it was turned on, a major glitch was immediately detected resulting in customers on one side the Highway leading into Esperanza Village being left without water.
  • STAR Humor
  • Editorial: Drastic Times Calls For Drastic Measures:
    There was a time, in the not so distant past, when gun related murders were spiraling out of control especially on the south side of the old capital, Belize City. After careful study, analysis and consultation, the government of the day, charged with the responsibility for citizens' security, stepped up to the challenge resulting in the imposition of stiff, some might say draconian, amendments to the firearms act. Coupled with other measures, the nation began recording a decrease in gun related murders, resulting last year in the recording of a drastic reduction in, what many termed as, the senseless loss of life "on the mean streets of the city".
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  • Letters to the Editor
  • Public Notices