DPI agents accused of stealing and planting evidence held in judicial detenttion

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By LatAm Reports Staff Writers

The accused were referred to the prison in El Progreso, Yoro, and the initial hearing was scheduled for April 16 at 9:00 a.m.

A judge of the Criminal Court with National Jurisdiction in Respect of Organized Crime and Corruption issued a judicial detention on Thursday against eight active officers of the National Police assigned to the Police Investigation Directorate (DPI), accused of several crimes.

The defendants respond to the names of Bayron Isidro Ramos Hernández, Josiel Fernando Rueda Núñez, Wilson Josué Durón Valladares; Carlos Noé Núñez Álvarez, Joel Renán Zambrano Banegas, Rodys Edgardo Hernández Casco, Walter Alexander Muñoz Muñoz and Denis Alfredo Estrada López.

The Public Prosecutor ' s Office accuses them of the crimes of association to commit crimes, theft with violence and intimidation, abuse of authority, burst of abode by public officials.

Also, for falsification of public documents and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment by a public official.

The eight officers were referred to the El Progreso penal centre, Yoro, and the initial hearing was scheduled for April 16 at 9:00 a.m.

Relationship of the facts

According to the investigation, the incident occurred on January 12, 2024, at 4:40 a.m. when the defendants arrived on board two pick-up vehicles without plates, to a house in the Monte Fresco colony of San Pedro Sula, Cortés.

They violently broke the gate and entered, heading to the offended room and then took him to the room where he was beaten throughout his body, while other troops searched the house.

After being beaten, they began to interrogate him, asking him where he kept the money, drugs, firearms and valuables; the offended told them that he has none of that, because he is not engaged in crime.

All this while stripped him of two Iphones, his wallet with personal documents and money, an Apple Watch, a firearm, as well as trying to boycott the housing camera system.

They demanded money to leave him free.

After more than three hours of illegally being held and taken to different SPS locations, the police demanded the amount of 350 thousand lempiras to release him.

However, the offended told them that he does not have that amount of money, then observed that one of the police officers who pulled bags out of his vest and put them in his backpack; and when dawn he was taken to the IPR facility in SPS, even threatening to kill him.

Once in those facilities and after filing false investigative reports, they presented him as a member of a criminal structure, implanting bags of cocaine, marijuana and an automatic firearm, UZI machine gun type, continuing the threats to refer him to the MP with all that false evidence, in case they do not give them the amount of money they requested.

This article has been translated from the original which first appeared in Tunota