According to his lawyer, Jorge de los Santos, Alexis Villalona was authorized to post bail, depositing RD$40,000 in the Banco Agrícola. He cannot leave the country and must register with the court every 15 days. He had been serving three months of preventive custody.
Villalona made headlines after a video circulated on social media showing him beating and leaving Santa Arias lying on the street in the city of Baní after midnight on 31 December 2021 following a minor traffic accident between his vehicle and the victim riding on a motorcycle.
After two weeks on the run, Villalona was arrested on 14 January, found in the house of a niece in El Fundo, Peravia province.
The media has followed up on how Santa Arias recently opened a colmado (small grocery shop) in the front of her house. She said she received a loan for RD$150,000 from Banca Solidaria.
On 8 March, Villalona again made headlines when favored by the change in his preventive custody measures. The secretary of the Chamber of Deputies, Soraya Suarez (PRM-Santiago), described as “imprudent” that the court had ordered the release of the so-called “Abusador de Bani” precisely on 8 March, International Women’s Day. “It is outrageous and very discouraging for the struggle for the rights and respect for women, that on a day like this a judge decides to send to the streets, a man like Alexis Villalona, who everyone saw through social networks how he beat and left on the pavement a defenseless lady,” lamented the legislator.
Villalona was released on the morning of 8 March 2022 after the judge of the Court of Instruction (Tribunal de Atención Permanente de Baní) amended the coercive measure that had sent Villalona to serve three months in jail.
After the arrest of Villalona, Santa Arias withdrew the complaint for the aggression. At the time, the Public Prosecutor’s Office announced it would pursue the criminal action and the aggressor was still remanded in custody.
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9 March 2022