Death of accused robber raises questions – Love FM Belize News & Music Power

The family of 49-year-old Ronald, the accused robber who was shot, has launched a petition in the hope of exonerating him. Last week, Gibson died while recovering from gunshot wounds in the hospital. The Belmopan resident was shot by Gilda Abadi, who claimed Gibson tried to rob her and her daughter near Independence Park. Abadi told police that Gibson was about to attack and rob her when she pulled out her firearm and opened fire after he refused to back down. However, Gibson’s family does not believe her side of the story and says their brother was not a crook. His sister, Shawn Gardiner, spoke to the media today and stated that although her brother has passed away, she believes it is important that her brother’s name be cleared.

Shawn Gardiner, sister of Ronald Gibson: “I’ll get at least three hundred signatures or more if I can say what kind of person he was, you know? Because he was a hardworking man. He sold pastries for those who know him, he cut garden. He worked at Santander, so I don’t understand what they call that robbery he pulled off recently. I mean how can you rob someone when you are far away from him, probably drunk because he told me he drank something in a cup and I know it was rum because he always drinks. Maybe he was serving at the time, I don’t know, and then they felt like he was trying to rob them, but maybe they just felt threatened, you know, and they just shot him like there was no point. At least they could have fired a warning shot in the air or shot him in the feet. No one who robs will let you just load a gun and then wait to be shot. That’s nonsense.”

Reporter: What do you hope to achieve with this petition?

Shawn Gardiner, sister of Ronald Gibson: “What we hope to achieve, we just want to know so that the media can see what kind of person he is so that we can get some kind of justice with this.”

Gardiner added that aside from not being able to get much information from police, the family has yet to receive Gibson’s body.

Shawn Gardiner, sister of Ronald Gibson: “We have heard that it is the police, it is in the hands of the police and they are the ones investigating and it will take a while before we get the body. Well, the family has to bury their loved one, we can’t wait anymore, this has been taking too long. It’s almost three weeks now, so we have to bury our loved one. We all gotta get on with our lives, you know? We want to bury our loved one. We don’t want him in the hospital forever, you know? So we want the police to speed up the process, or whoever is in charge, the doctor, whoever. They are more questions than answers. I want to go into details about my brother and who shot him that night because this lady is wrong. Everyone says she’s wrong from the first story she told. I don’t have any proof, but I’ve heard different things and the police don’t even want to take us to investigate the scene, or anything, the family.

Gibson was shot in the abdomen and died days after being hospitalized.