The chief of the National Police, Major General Camilo Antonio Nazir Tejada, told the newspaper Hoy that the department is planning to carry out investigations and make subsequent raids in order to confiscate illegal firearms throughout the D.R. General Nazir Tejada’s comments came on the same day that an illegally owned revolver was used in a well-publicized murder and suicide by an ex-police officer in Santo Domingo.
Ramon Rodriguez Balbuena killed his ex-wife, Asia Bastardo Paredes, and then himself on 10 October in the middle of the busy Avenida Jose Contreras in Santo Domingo. Mr. Rodriguez had been convicted of the 15 March, 1990, murder of German geologist Gohan Guabe after the two were involved in a minor traffic accident. He was dismissed from the police department and convicted of the murder, yet spent only a short time in jail and was then helped to leave the country to travel to the United States. Hoy reported that he had recently been deported from the U.S., and had been stalking his ex-wife.