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As I have been watching from my balcony on Caye Caulker, I see a younger man (Larry) and a small child collecting money for a program in Belize City. He claims this program helps gang kids by providing basketball, football, and other activities which are funded by donation. He has a spiral notebook filled with signatures and donations collected. He boasts newspaper articles (or copies of them) that "prove" his work is legit. He proudly announces that he was once one of those kids and now that he is "set in life", as he puts it, he volunteers to collect money and work with the organization. However, as I watch, I see him filling a water bottle with rum which he drinks pretty much all day. I hear him (and the small boy) making harassing comments about women as they pass. I know they collect wads daily! One the day we arrived on the island, one taxi driver warned us to stay away from this man as he was scamming the tourists, drives a "big" car in the city, and uses the money himself. Don't know if he's legit or not....didn't give him any money...but have watched over a week as he lines his pockets. Does anybody know if this program and this guy are for real? It was nice on Sunday when he didn't set up shop on Front Street!
Scam artist. Take a picture and post it.
Great idea..take a picture of him and post it.
Sounds like the same guy that was doing that in San Pedro for years.
Carrying a binder that was all tattered , but folks still gave him money..
Shame he targets the tourist , whom of course don't know any better and want to help the kids....
My advice is that you don't take the advice of people telling you to take a picture and post it. I guarantee it will be more trouble than it's worth.

Ignore the fact that what he is doing is illegal, if someone tried to take away your livelihood you would be very upset; think about how this guy might react...
He is also in Belize City, working near the water taxi. While on CC, we got asked daily if we wanted to give him money. We turned him down. We knew he was a scam artist. Doing the "Lords" work, he said. These people are all over the world, not just in Belize. You can choose your own way of dealing with them. We just ignore and keep walking.
I'm wondering if this is the same guy who kept trying to hit us up on Ambergris Caye, mostly in 2012. He even told us he was collecting for a bicycle race in town and needed funds for bike parts for the kids. We told him we'd donate they day of the race if he told us where/when it was and it actually occurred. We went to the place at the time he said, and there was no one there. Needless to say, we were not surprised and relieved we hadn't donated in advance.

Tall guy with a notebook, and usually (but not always) traveling (on foot) with a child.
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