Ex-Chief of Dominican Drug Squad Charged in Theft of Cocaine

SANTO DOMINGO – The Dominican Republic’s former top counter-narcotics official and 24 other people were arrested Tuesday in connection with the theft of more than a ton of cocaine from a police storeroom, Attorney General Francisco Dominguez Brito said.

Facing charges along with the erstwhile chief of the DICAN agency, Carlos Fernandez Valerio, are 20 police officers, three prosecutors and a civilian, Dominquez Brito told a press conference.

The group is accused of stealing cocaine confiscated in a DICAN operation and then selling the drugs back to the traffickers who were the target of the original raid.

Investigators found that Fernandez Valerio and DICAN’s then-head of operations, Felix Humberto Lopez Paulino, distributed large sums in cash to the other suspects, who subsequently confessed to their part in the crime, the attorney general said.

“About this matter there is a very clear message: we can never allow he who is called upon to pursue crime, to combat crime, to seek peace in society, to ally himself with crime,” Dominguez Brito said.