Investigation into the Kidnapping and Murder of Ronald Ojeda Moreno: Walter Rodríguez Pérez and Tareck El Aissami Implications

2024-03-07 12:20:00
Walter Rodríguez Pérez and Tareck El Aissami

The investigation into the kidnapping and murder of former Venezuelan military officer Ronald Ojeda Moreno in Chile, whose body was found under cement last Friday in an irregular camp, continues to advance and yield new clues. Now it was learned that one of the fugitives would have links to Tareck El Aissami, former vice president of Venezuela and, at the time, strong man of Chavismo.

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This Tuesday, one of the objectives of the investigation emphasized the possible motive for the crime after it came to light that one of the fugitives, Walter Rodríguez Pérez, had worked for El Aissami. According to El Mercurio, this information now has to be confirmed by the Organized Crime and Homicide Team of the Chilean Prosecutor’s Office together with the Investigative Police of that country (PDI).

At the beginning of this week, it was reported that Walter Rodríguez Pérez, who would be one of the leaders behind the operation that finally ended Ojeda’s life, is accused of being an accessory to the crime.

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Although prosecutor Ángel Valencia pointed out that the proceedings continue in the most absolute secrecy, it was he himself who said that Rodríguez Pérez would have been in charge of the “surveillance and transfer of Ojeda” to the commune of Maipú, where police officers made the discovery. from her body.

The official indicated that the suspect, whose whereabouts are not yet known, would maintain a “current arrest warrant for his alleged participation in three other kidnappings” in the country, one of them related to the discovery of “three bodies in Curacaví in April of last year.”

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Data available on the website of the Venezuelan Social Security Institute indicate that Rodríguez Pérez worked for almost two months in the office of the former vice president of Venezuela in 2015, when the latter was governor of Aragua.

Taking the above into account, the Prosecutor’s Office began to investigate based on this information to confirm it, given that it could help clarify the crime.

So far, the only person detained for Ojeda’s murder is a 17-year-old Venezuelan youth, who entered the country irregularly and linked to the Aragua Train, who this Monday was formalized for the kidnapping of the soldier.

To find the Venezuelan teenager, investigators followed the routes of the cars used in the kidnapping, reviewing public and commercial security cameras. In a gas pump chamber, the face of the young man who was placed in provisional detention for 60 days appeared for the first time, since he is a minor.

According to the investigation, the subject “moved to the Independencia commune, staying there according to the analysis of his call traffic, between 10:22 p.m. and 11:44 p.m. Next, at 3:20 a.m., he and his companion went to the scene of the incident (…), providing support and cover to remove three of the subjects who posed as false police officers, fleeing the scene. company of the other car, identified as a Hyundai I10 (…) into which the victim and two other members of the criminal group were loaded.”

In total, three vehicles were identified in the case: a Hyundai, a Chevrolet Sail and a Nissan Versa.

Tareck El Aissami was vice president and former Minister of Petroleum of Venezuela

It was also possible to establish that there were three direct perpetrators of the crime, although other criminals participated in the preparation of the crime and others in hiding Ojeda.

The investigations determined that at least seven people participated in the events, with varying degrees of responsibility. Some of these subjects were already being investigated for other kidnappings and violent crimes.

A report from the PDI pointed out that “according to the analysis of the security cameras at the site of the event corresponding to the victim’s home, it was possible to establish the use of privileged information to expeditiously enter the home of the affected person, every time that the elevators were not in sight from the hall area, and there was no doubt or search when going to the victim’s apartment.”

The same document identified third parties as suspects who were able to provide this information, since days before the crime, on February 12, they made tours of the building where the uniformed man lived, as an inspection and without reason.

“We went in front of a building in the Independencia commune, where we parked to smoke marijuana around 11:30 p.m., until approximately 1:00 a.m.” This is how the statement made this Monday by the 17-year-old teenager accused of the case of the kidnapping and murder of Ronald Ojeda Moreno began.

According to an article published by El Mercurio, a newspaper that had access to the testimony, around 3:00 a.m. the only detainee so far in this case saw “a gray Nissan Versa vehicle arrive, with a blue light, where I realized they were coming.” five subjects dressed as members of the PDI assuming that they were going to carry out a raid. After about three minutes I saw that these supposed police officers came with a subject who was only wearing boxers, who they approached the Versa vehicle.”

He explained that it was then when one of the criminals began to record with his phone.

Police and forensic investigators work in the area where the body of former Venezuelan military officer Roland Ojeda was found, on March 1, in Santiago, Chile (AP Photo/Esteban Félix)

“Regarding this man that these supposed police officers were bringing,” he points out, “I noticed that they took him to the sidewalk, outside the entrance to the building’s parking lot, at the same time that the vehicle was taken out onto the street, a situation that seemed strange to me since the people dressed as police officers took the subject in boxers and showed him towards the vehicle in which he (the teenager) was staying with (name of his companion who remains withheld), which made me think that they knew that my friend was recording them. Then, they put him in the vehicle and leave,” he said.

According to his statement, shortly after the author of the video deleted it. After the events, he indicates that they decided to take him to his home, but that suddenly his partner made a turn “towards the highway lane where the Versa vehicle was found.” In that place, he stated, he again saw the “five guys dressed as police officers.” Then another group of people arrived, but “the five subjects got out, three getting into the vehicle in which (the accused) was and two with the victim into the other vehicle.”

When they were fleeing, he heard his accomplices complaining and shouting, worried about having left fingerprints on the Nissan Versa, “they said they had called their friend to extract them, (…) their mission was only to record the event.”

The vehicles, he says, took different routes amid conversations to call a third party to “burn the car,” the Nissan Versa involved in the kidnapping. Apparently the car had a mechanical problem and that’s why they had to abandon it.

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