Beloved Belmopan Doctor Killed While Taking Daughter to School

A sense of safety in Belmopan has been shaken tonight after a shocking, targeted killing in broad daylight. Police say a well-known and respected doctor was ambushed in the Las Flores area, as a masked gunman carried out the attack with chilling precision, right in front of witnesses. The brazen nature of the crime has left residents stunned and searching for answers, as police are scrambling to uncover what led to the killing. As the community grapples with the loss of a father and beloved professional, questions are mounting about motive and how something this violent could happen so openly in the capital. Britney Gordon reports.

 

Britney Gordon, Reporting

This morning, Dr. Nuan Bonilla and his five-year-old daughter were on their way to school when his vehicle came under sustained gunfire. Bullets rained down on the vehicle, killing Bonilla inside, all the while his young daughter sat in the back seat. They were less than five minutes away from their home in the Las Flores area of Belmopan when they were ambushed.

 

ASP Stacy Smith, Staff Officer

“Bonilla was on board his vehicle on Ramirez Avenue when his vehicle was overtaken by another vehicle which stopped in front of Dr. Bonilla’s vehicle. An armed male person is reported to have exited that vehicle and fired several shots, which resulted in the fatal injury of Dr. Bonilla. Police have retrieved a number of video footage which we believe will be of use to this ongoing investigation. The investigators are also following up on two leads as it relates to motive, neither of which suggests Dr. Bonilla’s involvement in nefarious activities.”

 

Dr. Bonilla, a beloved doctor, dedicated years of his life as a specialist in internal medicine and worked at the Belmopan Medical Imaging Center for the past eight years. Director, Dr. Virginia Smith, says his death is a heavy blow to the medical community and Belmopan.

 

Dr. Virginia Smith, Director, Belmopan Medical Imagining Center

“I saw not just any ordinary young doctor. I saw a doctor that was extremely dedicated, charismatic, compassionate heart and kind, extremely knowledgeable. The special thing that I saw about him was that he would spend an entire hour with each one of his patients, going over their history, allowing them to talk as much as they wanted to. Of course, going over their clinical details, reviewing their labs, and him giving them his advice was the special part that people loved about him.”

 

Police have yet to determine a motive for the incident however, Minister of Home Affairs Oscar Mira, says police are doing all that they can do to bring the killer to justice.

 

Oscar Mira, Minister of Home Affairs

“The investigators are working very hard. From this, early this morning investigators and police department has been working hard to ensure that we solve it. We do have technology in place. We do have cameras around that we are reviewing. The investigators have been reviewing everything that happened this morning, and I am very confident that we are going to solve it. Very unfortunate. This is not what we want. We want to make sure that we investigate fully, and that we bring whoever it is that we need to bring. And as I said before, it’s a great loss for our community. It’s a great loss for the country. Someone who dedicated his life to helping others.”

 

Beyond his work at the Belmopan Medical Imaging Center, Bonilla also served patients in the Valley of Peace community. Smith shared that Bonilla has aspirations to take his practice further and serve more people across Belize.

 

Dr. Virginia Smith

“There’s no words for it. This should not happen. A young doctor when a person goes to study medicine, their young prime years of their life that they spend studying to become doctors. They come back to us wanting to serve, trying to save lives, and to have something like this occur in a split second, your life is taken away, is just not acceptable. So I, I would like to call on the authorities to get to the bottom of it. We pray that that this, we can get some answers for this horrible crime.”

 

Following Bonilla’s death, tributes have poured in across social media, as former patients grieve the loss of a man who dedicated his life to helping others. Britney Gordon for News Five.

 

As of now, no arrest have been made in connection with this crime.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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