2024-01-13 10:52:30
“The gang was known as “Los Viajeros” and had operated in Lara, Trujillo, Barinas, Yaracuy and even Bolívar, robbing banks, jewelry stores and armored vehicles.
Events.- In the 70s and 80s there was a TV series with the character of a completely bald police lieutenant. He was Kojak. During those times, people used to give the nickname “Kojak” to any bald person.
In those days, one of the most dangerous gangs in the country was captained by Luis Matute Becerra, who was known as alias Kojak due to his baldness. The gang was known as “Los Viajeros” and had operated in Lara, Trujillo, Barinas, Yaracuy and even Bolívar, robbing banks, jewelry stores and armored vehicles. His loot reached one hundred million bolivars, an extraordinary sum for the time.
One of his subordinates was “A Thousand Faces,” known for his ability to disguise himself and called Francisco Salas Pérez, a former police officer, as violent as Kojak himself, who did not hesitate to shoot each other with police or private security guards. They had several homicides in their files.
But each time the PTJ made the fence tighter. In January 1981, information was processed that the group was in Barinas, staying at the “Valle Hondo” hotel. The operation once morest the subjects is mounted, there is a violent confrontation and “Mil Caras” falls down but the others cannot be found.
Three months later, in March, Kojak and his three remaining cronies return to their old ways. They decide to rob the headquarters of Banco Caracas, in the town of Pampan, in the state of Trujillo. As usual, they must first steal a vehicle in another town, and in Barquisimeto they get a pickup. They carry a good arsenal: three Browning HP 9mm pistols, an Uzi submachine gun, another Madsen submachine gun, and a 38 spl chicken gut revolver.
At mid-morning on the 20th they fall upon their prey: they immobilize the manager, employees, guards and clients and leave with Bs. 280,000.oo. But as soon as they leave they encounter a commission from the Trujillo police. The thugs rain a shower of lead on the police, injuring an official, and they manage to escape, but the bandits are recognized and all the alarms go off. Hell will break loose across three states that will last two days. The hunt begins.
As they fled, passing through the San Rafael de Boconó hamlet, a checkpoint blocked their path and they opened fire, wounding three police officers and were able to continue their escape. Later, in Flor de Patria, they abandon the truck that is already radioed to all the police forces and steal a Ford Fairmont, with which they can reach Aguas Negras where they steal a faster car, a Caprice, but they abandon it in El Batatal , in which a ranch truck is stolen, taking its owner as a hostage. Upon reaching the crossroads of Chabasquén, near Biscocuy, the kidnapped person, who knows that ahead there is a checkpoint with armed officials, nervously jumps out of the vehicle to save his life.
When they reach the checkpoint the criminals throw two grenades and are able to continue past. Then, already in Portuguesa, almost reaching Guárico, they see another checkpoint. There Kojak gets out and shows a fake police ID. He suddenly points gun at the four police officers, they disarm them and take them hostage in the Jeep patrol car. They force an official to drive to pretend that they are idiots, but when they find the next checkpoint Kojak tries to machine-gun the officials, but with a heroic gesture, the police driver, Evaristo Avila, violently turns the wheel and the blast misses its target, so Kojak kills him right there. The patrol crashes, and Kojak executes another of the hostages. The robbers go down and empty their machine guns and pistols at the officials, killing two more. Two other police officers are injured. The other officials empty their revolvers and when they run out of bullets they flee the scene.
Later they steal another pickup and take the driver hostage, forcing him to drive. Alerted, all Lara police officers installed checkpoints at different points on the roads. It was already followingnoon, when on the road to Quibor there was a queue at the police checkpoint, from the truck they launched machine gun bursts at the officials, who responded with their service weapons and killed the thug Pedro Miguel Mora (a) Caraquita.
Another criminal, Elvis José Resplandor, was wounded by a gunshot to the head. The shooting continues for half an hour with Kojak and José Luis Noguera “El Cumanés” barricading themselves behind the truck, a moment that the kidnapped driver takes advantage of to escape. A reinforcement patrol arrives and more lead. Kojak is shot several times in the chest, but the bulletproof vest he was wearing saves him. Finally, an accurate bullet to the head puts him out of combat, wounded. The last criminal, a certain José Luis, wounded by two low shots to the head, stripped a customer of his motorcycle and fled the scene.
The injured, both thugs and officials, are taken to the José María Pineda hospital in Barquisimeto, which is taken over by PTJ, Disip, state police and the entire press. Kojak is taken out of an ambulance, and he is fully conscious and talks briefly with a journalist before entering the operating room. He doesn’t seem badly hurt in the video broadcast on television. The next day it is reported that the dangerous thug died “while he was being operated on.” Many people breathed easy with that news. The violent escalation had lasted two days.
Seven dead, four police officers and three thieves. Five vehicles stolen, hundreds of shots fired and several grenades detonated in one of the bloodiest criminal events recorded.
The only one of the robbers who survived was sentenced to thirty years in prison, but he did not serve them in full because he was murdered in the Sabaneta prison.
By: Luis Heraclio Medina C.
1705150605
#Kojak #opens #gates #hell
