Four police officers, arrested on the orders of the District Attorney of West Santo Domingo, will appear in court on 21 June 2018 when a judge will decide on coercive measures after the officers were charged for having taken some RD$1.5 million that belonged to a businesswoman in los Alcarrizos who had been robbed. Police spokesman Frank Durand Mejia confirmed the information regarding the case as he explained that the woman had been robbed by a man with whom the officers made contact with and the money from the robbery never appeared.
Two colonels, Francisco Radhamés Vargas Ureña and Santiago Sanchez Galvez were detained together with Captain Martin Made Lara and second Lieutenant Ormandis Onesimo Alcantara Castillo. The four men are currently being held at the jail of Special Operations in Manoguayabo.
According to attorney Mayobanex Ferreras, who represents the businesswoman, on 5 June a thief broke into the woman’s house in Los Alcarrizos and took money and jewelry. The woman filed a complaint with the police and investigators from the Department of Criminal Investigation (Dicrim) arrested the thief and recovered what he had stolen, according to the lawyer. After this, allegedly the officers negotiated with the thief and they offered him RD$250,000 to stay quiet and they let him go. It is suspected that the police officers kept the rest of the stolen property.
The woman suspected the money was stolen by an individual she had hired to install surveillance videos in her home. He would later admit the robbery and returned part of the money.
A search of newspaper records turned up a 2010 report on then Lieutenant Colonel Francisco Radhames Vargas Ureña who had to post a RD$2 million bail bond, together with periodical presentation before the court and severe travel restrictions as coercive measures on an accusation of intent to distribute, together with an assistant district attorney Luciana Florentino and other members of the Police, some 4 kg of cocaine.
The case is now back in court. So far, the colonels have denied the accusations.
Read more in Spanish:
El Nacional
Diario Libre
Listin Diario
21 June 2018
