Dominican Republic: the killer of the Minister of the Environment was a childhood friend
Environment Minister Orlando Jorge Mera was killed by a childhood friend.
AP - Alexander Arias
Text by: RFI Follow
1 min
In the Dominican Republic, the Minister of the Environment, Orlando Jorge Mera, was shot dead on Monday in his office.
The assassin would be a childhood friend of the victim.
Advertising
Read more
The killer was a childhood friend, the family said.
Orlando Jorge Mera was meeting with his deputy ministers in Santo Domingo when Miguel Cruz burst into the room and shot him.
As a close friend, he'd had no trouble getting past Ministry security.
He was then arrested in a church, three kilometers away, after confessing to the priest that he had committed a murder, without further details, and giving him his weapon.
►Also read: Dominican Republic: the Minister of the Environment shot dead
Miguel Cruz is, according to sources close to the investigation, a businessman.
The local press affirms that he would have killed Orlando Jorge Mera in retaliation for the closure, on the orders of his friend, of a cement works which he owned.
In 2020, when he was appointed, the minister, son of former Dominican president Salvador Jorge Blanco, promised to protect the ecosystem, work for the responsible use of resources and tackle pollution.
Last March, he claimed to have brought before the courts, in less than two years, 300 cases, attacking, among others, soldiers, police officers and business leaders, in particular for violation of environmental permits or illegal logging.
A three-day national mourning has been declared.
Newsletter
Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_EN
Dominican Republic