Santa Elena Man Found Shot, Dies Hours Later

It was just after three on Sunday morning, October twelfth, when police on patrol in Santa Elena stumbled upon a man lying in the street with severe head injuries. That man was later identified as forty-two-year-old Shawn Hertular. He was rushed to the San Ignacio Hospital, but hours later, he didn’t make it. A postmortem revealed the shocking truth, Hertular had been shot. But Hertular was no stranger to the law. In fact, just last year, March 2024, he walked free after being acquitted of a murder charge tied to the brutal stabbing of Miguel Zaiden back in November 2021. Zaiden, a Belize City resident, was attacked and stabbed multiple times as he tried to escape on his motorcycle. And that wasn’t Hertular’s first run-in with the justice system, before that, he served twenty years behind bars for another killing. Tonight, investigators say they have a person of interest, and the hunt is on in this ongoing homicide investigation.

 

ASP Stacy Smith, Staff Officer

“On Sunday, October 12^th, 2025, at approximately 3:30 a.m., officers attached to the Santa Elena Police Station were conducting patrols in the Bradley Bank area when they were alerted to the presence of a male person with injuries to the head in a street on that area. This male person, whose name was learned to be Shawn Hertular, forty-two years old, was escorted to the San Ignacio Hospital for treatment, however, some hours later he succumbed to the injuries that he sustained. A postmortem examination has since been conducted on the body of Hertular which revealed that he died from a gunshot wound. The investigators have identified a person of interest who is being sought in connection with this ongoing homicide investigation.”