Global Courant
The victims were a couple of Bolivian quinteros. They are investigating whether there are more officers involved who simulated a raid to commit the assault.
A Corrientes Police commissioner who worked as deputy chief of the Infantry Division was arrested for assaulting a couple of quinteros in the peripheral area of the provincial capital, in mid-June.
Justice is now trying to determine if the officer acted in complicity with other police officers and used the arsenal of force to break into the property simulating a raid.
The arrest of Commissioner Cristhian Vargas Exquetino (39) was ordered by the prosecutor Maria Lucrecia Troia Quirch, after obtaining a huge amount of evidence with the collaboration of the Complex Crimes Investigation Directorate of the Corrientes Police.
Commissioner Cristhian Vargas Exquetino (39), arrested in Corrientes for an assault. Facebook photo
The officer is being investigated for an armed robbery that occurred on a rural property in the early hours of June 17. At least four men wearing police uniforms and carrying short and long weapons entered the house located in the Paso Pesoa area, about three kilometers from National Route 12, simulating a raid.
The occupants of the house, a couple of Bolivian nationality, reported that the criminals forced them to lie face down on the floor and began to search the place for money, jewelry and other valuables.
The victims found it strange because the group acted in Corrientes Police uniforms, had handy-type communication equipment, and used terms typical of a security force.
The group was traveling in a truck and seemed to have accurate information, since they made a thorough search of a car that was parked on the property. Finally they fled with half a million pesos, some jewelry and cell phones.
The Justice ordered the arrest of the commissioner and a search of his house.
An employee of the place, who lives meters from the house, noticed the movement at dawn and alerted the Police, who sent a patrol car from section 21, the closest, to the place. The man also notified a neighbor, a member of the Naval Prefecture.
The prefect took his regulation weapon and approached the property, where he held a dialogue with the gate criminals involved. The group maintained that he was an “operative” and with his flashlights they illuminated his uniforms, a situation that reassured the prefect, who returned home despite the fact that everything seemed very strange to him.
But it would not be the only problem that Vargas Exquetino would face that morning. When he was leaving the property together with his accomplices aboard his truck, he was intercepted by the patrolman of section 21 who was heading to the farm.
Excuses and “chapeo”
The commissioner was forced to get out of the vehicle and “chapear” to be able to continue his return trip to the city of Corrientes. He told the officer in charge of the patrol that she was in the area looking for a person. A few hours later, at 7 o’clock, the officer took his duty in the Infantry.
The prosecutor in the case would also have a series of images from security cameras that show the movement of Vargas Exquetino’s truck towards the area of the robbery. And now they are trying to determine if he also used the arsenal of the Infantry Division.
This Monday the prosecutor ordered a search of the operational base where the commissioner worked. From there they took the books of news and weapons to be examined. Later they went to Vargas Exquetino’s house, in the 17 de Agosto neighborhood, where other elements were also kidnapped, in addition to the truck he usually uses.
The Corrientes Police Headquarters made the pass available to the suspect, who is the son of a retired general commissioner of the force.
The Security Minister of Corrientes, Buenaventura Duarte, acknowledged that the commissioner and his accomplices “used weapons and Police uniforms, dirtying a historic institution, whose function is to take care of the life and property of the people of Corrientes.” The official admitted that “there could be more police involved” in the case.
EMJ
