14ymedio, Havana, 27 March 2024 — A short video shows the moment when a man entered, last Monday, the building where independent journalist Julio Aleaga Pesant resides on 1st Street, between C and D, in El Vedado, Havana. About 40 minutes later, the same security camera, from a private cafeteria located on the ground floor of the building, captures the subject leaving with a bicycle and a bulging bag.
The journalist’s wife arrived a little after noon and found the door broken. The family immediately filed a complaint with the police. Nobody saw the thief or heard the noise he presumably made when violently accessing the property. The only traces left by the criminal are the images captured by the private cafeteria camera on the ground floor.
In the brief sequence, you see an individual walking quickly, wearing a cap with a visor, sports pants and a cross-body bag, who enters the staircase to the building. The restaurant table closest to that entrance is occupied by four people, and an employee moves between the room, located on a terrace overlooking the street, and the service desk.
The next image is captured 40 minutes later. At the table now there are other people, and the same man leaves the building, but this time with a bicycle, owned by Aleaga’s son. The camera captures the thief’s bag, which was empty when he arrived and now is bulging.
After reporting what happened, the Police arrived at Aleaga’s house and took the fingerprints left by the thief at the door. They also took the recording of the security camera of the cafeteria, La Chuchería, located on the ground floor. The agents were struck by the fact that there were no open drawers or furniture that showed they had been searched.
“It looks like they went straight to the laptop,” the uniformed men told him. Aleaga suspects that State Security is behind the robbery, since they have harassed the journalist for years, with police operations around his home, subpoenas and arrests.
So far, the family has no clue about the man who robbed them in broad daylight
So far, the family has no clue about the man who robbed them in broad daylight. Residents of the area, with multiple private businesses and very close to luxury hotels such as the Grand Aston and Meliá Cohiba, feel safer than in other parts of the capital where there are more robberies.
According to Colonel Idael Fumero Valdés, head of Information and Analysis of the Technical Directorate of Investigations of the Ministry of the Interior, recently invited to Cuban Television, robberies account for 25% of the violent crimes that occur on the Island. These are cases in which some means of force is used, such as breaking a door or forcing a lock.
Faced with the growing number of complaints on social networks about these events, Fumero was categorical: “violent crimes are not increasing, which doesn’t mean that there is no increase in other crimes.”
Translated by Regina Anavy
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