DR1 Daily News - Dominican Republic

Late last week, the appearance, capture and ransoming of a raccoon made headlines in the Dominican Republic. In part, this is because there are no raccoons supposed to be on the island of Hispaniola in the first place, and because the guys that captured the animal are asking for a ransom of RD$100,000 to hand over the animal.

The animal, as previously stated is not native, and must have arrived here on board a container, since it is extremely unlikely for one of the very wild animals to have been brought here as a pet, given the controls at all of the airports.

Wildlife inspectors from the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources have visited the barrio of Cristo Rey where the raccoon is supposedly kept, but have not been able to convince the “raccoon-nappers” to deliver the animal to the authorities.

Given the extraordinary appearance of the non-native animal, the men...