14ymedio, Madrid, 7 July 2023 — Raidel Perera Romero, a fugitive from justice for more than a year, has been arrested by the Police in Santo Domingo, Villa Clara. According to Fuerza del Pueblo, a page related to the Ministry of the Interior, the “antisocial element,” who had an 11-year prison sentence for robbery with force, was hidden by the “intricate areas” of the towns of Manacas and Mordazo.
It was the neighbors themselves who denounced him, after he committed several cattle thefts. Now, the Facebook post says, “he will have to comply with a penalty for the crimes of robbery with force, evasion from prison and theft and slaughter of livestock.”
Villa Clara leads the ranking for cattle theft, which in 2022, according to official data, amounted to 82,445 head throughout the Island: 45,315 cows and 37,130 horses, the equivalent of 22 million pounds of meat.
In that province alone there were 12,243 cases, compared to 4,079 in the previous year, or triple the amount. In second place is Holguín, which lost 9,825 head in 2022, doubling the number for 2021 (4,655), and in third place, Matanzas, which went from 2,926 to 8,159 losses.
Last May, desperate because of a crime that doesn’t let up, the Government pointed out last year’s approval of the “the slaughter and consumption of beef for self-consumption,” has led to the increase in cattle thefts.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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