by Blaire Santos | December 21, 2023 | Hib Ahn Lang Shoa
Cop Slayer
By Blaire Santos
June 4, 1963
That night, Pinita kept vigil outside the execution yard. She and at least two hundred others had followed Nora Parham’s eight sons into the narrow belly of Gabourel Lane outside Her Majesty’s Prison. As Pinita awaited the Queen’s missive, she protested and prayed, hoping that a stay of execution would arrive before eight o’clock in the morning.
Pinita stared down the policemen and British officers whom First Minister George Price, the leader of local government, had sent to subdue them—so that Nora, the ‘cop slayer,’ would be hanged without a hitch. Although law enforcement had prevented another riot, they hadn’t managed to keep any peace. Imbued with righteousness, they got into arguments left, right and centre.
“You noh hear how she kill the poor man? Da coolie woman left ahn deh fi dead, naked one, with no dignity. What a way. He da mi corporal, you know.”
“But Ketchell Trapp used to beat that woman bad. Lone drinking and beating. Every time he used to get lee liquor eena his system, that woman get beat. She mi report it to police nine time, and unu neva do nothing.”
“Beat—noh kill, and that da man and woman business. I might a mi beat ahn too if she mi try pass off dehn shalai pikni pan me, and Nora mi di think bout do it long time. Mrs. Fuller seh how when they mi di stay by she, Nora threaten fi bun up Trapp with lard. Price got it right—Nora da wa cop slayer.”
“Nora da mi no cop slayer,” Pinita interrupted. “She da wa seamstress! School uniform, dress and wedding frock, you name it, Nora could sew it. I used to babysit fi she and Trappy. So, I da mi good friend with dehn.”
Silence snapped through the crowd like a whip when people began to recognise her. In February, Pinita was just a 14-year-old, volunteering at the Orange Walk Hospital because she wanted to be a nurse. Now, Agpripina “Pinita” Espejo was infamous after her court testimony and antics inspired a petition to pardon Nora.
“Everybody mi like Trappy,” she continued. “So, when I see they bring ahn eena emergency bun up from head to toe, ih bruk my heart, but Nora neva do it. When Corporal Clarke get ih statement, Trappy seh he mi give Nora wa couple licks. During the scuffle, Nora stone ah with wa gasoline can. After she run weh, he take off his clothes and gone use the pit toilet, and da when he light wa match fi try light wa cigarette, that da when ih set ih own self pan fire.”
February 6, 1963
Pinita went to visit Nora at the Orange Walk piss house. She looked at Nora’s pretty face—black, blue and bulging.
“Nora, I just come from hospital. They transfer Trappy to Belize City. Weh happen with you and he?”
“He beat me. He buss eena the room with wa stick and start beat me, just cause wa man pass and tell me hello.”
That night, as Pinita babysat Nora and Trapp’s youngest son, Trapp died.
April 30, 1963
Nora was nice and neat and pretty again when she pled not guilty. Earlier that morning, Pinita ascended the stairs of the Supreme Court, breathing the unfamiliar scent of Regent Street—of pigeons and pelicans fighting for dominance where the river meets the sea. She had come all the way to Belize City to testify on Nora’s behalf.
“I was about to iron,” Nora testified. “I had a gasoline iron in my hand with a pan of gasoline. He came in the bedroom with a stick in his hand and hit me on my head. When he was going to hit me, another hit, I threw the gasoline on him, and he grabbed away the pan from me, and I went through the backdoor, and he stone me with the said pan. After he stoned, I ran around the house, and he never see where I got to. I went in the house through the front door. While I was inside, I heard a noise, and I run to see what it was. When I went, I saw Ketchell Trapp come out of the latrine under fire. I then run up to help him, but I see I could not; then I continued running towards the Hospital back street, running towards the station.”
Pinita sat in the courtroom believing Nora had told the truth, but nobody else did because Trapp’s statement now declared that Nora had locked him in the latrine and set it on fire.
Pinita yelled, “That’s a lie. Unu change the statement!” However, no one believed her. And nobody believed Pinita when she testified that Nora was badly beaten. Instead, they believed the man.
Fernando Zetina Rosado said, “When I examined Nora the following day, February 7, all I noticed on her was a wound on her left shoulder that would have been eight days old—nothing inflicted in the prior thirty-six hours. When Pinita called him a liar too, Chief Justice Innis charged her with contempt of court.
Before the jury of twelve men delivered their verdict, Innis assured them that they could ask for clemency, which they did, but no such mercy was granted, and Innis sentenced Nora to death.
Nora’s sympathisers gathered two thousand four hundred and sixty-one signatures in the following weeks. Pinita’s was etched firmly amongst them. There was no appeals process, but Governor Stallard could grant a pardon. Pinita had gone with Nora’s boys with the plea to no avail. The honourable governor had refused them his audience. Instead, he sent a lackey to deliver a message: I will only hear from you in writing.
On the advice of George Price, touted as ‘the man of the people,’ Stallard confirmed Nora’s sentence because justice must be served. But Pinita felt that Price just wanted Nora dead to best Phillip Goldson, the leader of the opposition, who kept pressing and begging in the Belize Billboard for Nora to be pardoned “for the sake of her sons.”
Nonetheless, Pinita did not give up. Since appealing to men had gotten her nowhere, she and her thousands petitioned the Queen.
June 5, 1963
And so Pinita waited, hoping that Her Royal Highness would intervene at any moment now. But night ran its course, and dew layered the foundations of mourning, and the sun rose and chilled Pinita to the bone.
Constable Eustace Pandy escorted Nora from the Old Goal block at eight o’clock sharp. Nora progressed in silence. To Pinita, she looked brave. She believed Nora was great, as she smiled that pretty smile. Nora didn’t look sorrowful at all. So, Pinita decided to be brave and great when the noose ripped into Nora’s throat, when the Heavenly Father didn’t grant the mercy of a broken neck, when little five-foot-nothing Nora swayed there and turned from brown to blue.
June 6, 1963
“No black flag, no bell, and not even any noise audible to the public was made when eight o’clock came, and Nora was hanged,” —the Belize Billboard.
But when a postman finally delivered the Queen’s pardon, Pinita remembered how Nora would sew the most beautiful dresses and iron them to a crisp. She remembered Nora’s crinkled form in a shabby pine box in an unmarked grave and screamed.
Hib Ahn Lang Shoa
Agripina Espejo became the first female Mayor of Orange Walk Town. She served as a Justice of the Peace and a Commissioner of the Supreme Court and received the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for her chivalry. Espejo maintained Parham’s innocence and campaigned for her to be exonerated until her death on December 4, 2014.
Nora Parham was the only known woman executed in Belize. Belize’s House of Representatives posthumously exonerated Parham on May 13, 2022. Her body was exhumed and reburied on June 5, 2022.
LEarn More
Belize Police Department – Family Violence Unit (Ministry of National Security) – NCFC
Belize · Commonwealth Says No More
Gender-Based Violence – Belize Crime Observatory (bco.gov.bz)
Works Cited
“46 Years Ago – The Crown Against Nora Parham.” Amandala Newspaper, 7 Apr. 2009, amandala.com.bz/news/46-years-ago-the-crown-against-nora-parham.
“59 Years Later, Nora Parham Exonerated!” Amandala Newspaper, 17 May 2022, amandala.com.bz/news/59-years-later-nora-parham-exonerated/#:~:text=Friday%2C%20May%2013%2C%20was%20an%20emotional%20and%20momentous,at%20the%20sitting%20of%20the%20House%20of%20Representatives.
Herrera, Yvette, et al. Kriol – Inglish Dikshineri | English – Kriol Dictionary, edited by Paul Crosbie. Belize Kriol Project, 2009.
“Inside Her Majesty’s Prison with Bernard Adolphus.” Amandala Newspaper, 10 Feb. 2012, amandala.com.bz/news/inside-her-majestys-prison-with-bernard-adolphus.
Ministry of Human Development, Families and Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs. “Memorial Service for Nora Parham nee Williams.” Facebook, 5 June 2022, 10:52 a.m., https://www.facebook.com/MHDFIPA/videos/memorial-service-for-nora-parham-nee-williams/443492927777949/.
“More on the Nora Parham Story.” Amandala Newspaper, 26 Mar. 2009, amandala.com.bz/news/more-on-the-nora-parham-story.
“Nora Parham to Be Posthumously Pardoned.” Amandala Newspaper, 11 Mar. 2022, amandala.com.bz/news/nora-parham-to-be-posthumously-pardoned.
“Nora Parham’s Relatives Want More Answers.” Amandala Newspaper, 4 Sept. 2009, amandala.com.bz/news/nora-parhams-relatives-want-more-answers.
“Old Goal Built in 1857.” Belize Music World, http://www.belizemusicworld.com/The-Old-Gaol—History–1826.html#:~:text=It%20was%20a%20cumbrous%20wooden%20structure%20surmounted%20by,of%20the%20Colony%20and%20known%20as%20Belize%20Prison. Accessed 4 Dec. 2023.
Orange Walk Town Council. “The Orange Town Council Gives Final Honors to the Late Agripina “Pinita” Espejo, First Female Mayor of Orange Walk Town.” Facebook, 7 Dec. 2014, 10:09 p.m., https://www.facebook.com/orangewalktowncouncil/videos/the-orange-walk-town-council-gives-final-honors-to-the-late-agripina-pinita-espe/745773472176487/.
“‘She Was Brave’ – the Nora Parham Tragedy.” Amandala Newspaper, 5 June 2020, amandala.com.bz/news/she-was-brave-the-nora-parham-tragedy.
Username Marty. “Nora Parham: The Only Woman Ever Hanged in Belize.” Ambergris Caye Belize Message Board, ambergriscaye.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/442544/nora-parham-the-only-woman-ever-hanged-in-belize.html. Accessed 16 Nov. 2023.
—. “Orange Walk First Female Mayor Passes.” Ambergris Caye Belize Message Board, ambergriscaye.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/498623/orange-walk-first-female-mayor-passes.html. Accessed 2 Dec. 2023.
Wikipedia contributors. “Nora Parham.” Wikipedia, 12 Nov. 2023, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nora_Parham.
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