Archive for June, 2019
El Salto del Limón en Samaná is running out of water due to drought and logging
El Salto del Limón, an internationally known waterfall, of the tourist attractions of greatest symbolism in the province of Samaná, is about to disappear due to the low influx of water.
Jean Suriel, Meteorological Analyst said that “the emblematic Salto El Limón, in Samaná, northeast of the Dominican Republic, is almost running out of water. Last Sunday he was caught with a weak free fall. Several factors have affected it: the drought that has developed in the Dominican Republic since the end of 2018 and the logging in the mountainous area where the river is born. »
Source: Somospueblo
June 26, 2019
Respect the turtles that lay their eggs on Dominican beaches
Local press is urging the population to back reproduction of turtles in the Caribbean. The Caribbean nesting season runs from May to July. The species that nest here are Hawksbill (Carey), Green (Verde), Leatherback (Tinglar) and Loggerhead (Caguama or Cabezona).
Cristiana de la Rosa, in charge of the Program for Restoration of Coastal and Marine Ecosystems at the Ministry of Environment and marine biologist Omar Shamir Reynoso of the National Authority of Maritime Affairs said turtles survival is threatened by human activities. They spoke during the Biennial 9th Conference of Parties to the Inter-American Convention for the Protection and Conservation of Sea Turtles (IAC) that was held 12-14 June 2019 in Santo Domingo.
The presentations focused on how the reproduction of the turtles is threatened by practices such as bycatch, capture, looting of eggs, destruction or alteration of their habitats by urban coastal development and climate change.
Sea turtles lay their eggs on all the coasts of the Dominican Republic. Among beaches known for turtle nesting are La Vacama, Playa Muerta, El Valle, Cosón, Parque Nacional Jaragua, Cabarete, Los Yayales, Manresa, Isla Saona, Isla Catalina, Punta Cana, Guibia, Los Pescadores, Estero Hondo, and Sosua.
Source: DR1, https://conserveturtles.org/
June 24, 2019
Used tire sales down 70% after new regulation by Intrant
The recent prohibition on the use and installation of used, remodeled or out-of-date tires has reduced the sale of these tires by 70% in the local market. Francisco Ramirez, who owns a used tire store in Villa Juana, told El Dia that this decree by the National Institute for Ground Transportation and Transit (Intrant) is affecting both the seller and the clients, since new tires cost upwards of RD$3,000 and more, and not everyone is willing to pay that price.
Ramirez asks: “If they allow the import of tires made in 2015, what are they going to do with them in January of 2020? With five or six million tires imported, what are they going to do?
Moises Vidal says that used tires are affordable since prices vary with the size of the tire. A “concho” can buy tires that cost betweenRD$500 and RD$700, and tires for the hundreds, maybe thousands of Hyundais on the road cost between RD$1,200 and RD$1,400. The cost of these tires to the wholesalers varies with the size and the year of manufacture.
According to the Customs office, there were nearly 1.4 million used, light vehicle tires imported in 2018. Only a little over 11,000 truck tires were imported. Most of the tires come from South Korea, China, Spain and Germany. Fines for the use of unsafe tires can be over RD$5,000.
Source: DR1, Eldia
June 24, 2019
Authorities now suspect mistaken identity in case of David Ortiz shooting
Attorney General Jean Alain Rodríguez Sánchez and the director of the National Police, Ney Aldrin Bautista, shared their preliminary conclusion that the shooting that injured David Ortiz at the Dial Bar & Lounge of Av. Venezuela on Sunday, 9 June 2019, was a case of mistaken identity. They made the statement during a press conference on 5:30pm on Wednesday, 19 June 2019, before the Corpus Christi holiday in the Dominican Republic.
The Attorney General and the Police director say the target of the hired killer was David Ortiz’s close friend, Sixto David Fernández Vásquez, who was seated at the same bar table with him on the evening of the shooting. Fernández had arrived early to prepare for the get-together with Ortiz at the bar. David Ortiz was a frequent visitor at the bar.
At the time of the shooting, Sixto David Fernandez shared a table with David Ortiz, TV commentator Jhoel Lopez, urban singer Secreto El Famoso Biberón, and María Yeribel Santiago García.
According to the hypothesis of the Attorney General and Police, a 25-year old hitman was hired to shoot Fernández. The accused hitman Rolfy Ferreras Cruz (who has also been referred to as Ramon Martinez Perez, Bayan, Sandy) has a criminal record in the United States and had just arrived a month before from the US.
The authorities say the motive was a long-time grudge carried by fugitive Victor Hugo Gomez Vásquez, a cousin of Sixto David Fernández Vásquez. Fernández Vásquez is the owner of an autopaint shop in the National District. Gómez Vásquez blamed his cousin for telling on him to the National Drug Control Agency in 2011. This led him to serve time in La Victoria jail. The authorities presented Gómez Vásquez as the intellectual author of the crime. Gómez Vásquez is at present a fugitive of US justice sought for drug trafficking.
Surveillance camera footage was presented to back the hypothesis the authorities reached after the arrest of around a dozen people.
The Police identified Alberto Miguel Rodriguez Mota as the crime coordinator. He was at the scene of the crime hours before Sixto David Fernandez and then David Ortiz arrived.
The Police presented a video and the blurred smartphone photo sent to the hitman two hours before the crime to justify how the accused hitman, Rolfy Ferreras Cruz, had confused Ortiz with Fernández. When the picture was sent, David Ortiz had not arrived to the bar.
The surveillance video presented by the Police also shows how Rodríguez Mota is the only person at the scene of the crime who did not run for cover after the shot was fired, and instead watched over how Ortiz collapsed and even picked up his beer for another drink.
The Police explained that Alberto Miguel Rodríguez Mota and Victor Hugo Gómez Vásquez met in the La Victoria jail when they both served time.
As reported in El Dia, the Dominican authorities have not been able to locate the whereabouts of the three identified as the masterminds in the case: Luis Alfredo Rivas Clase (El Cirujano), Alberto Miguel Rodríguez Mota and Víctor Hugo Gómez Vásquez. Police director Bautista said during the Wednesday press conference that they are in contact with the US Marshals Service and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to locate the fugitives.
The hypothesis presented on 19 June 2019 by the Police and Attorney General has been met with generalized local and international skepticism. TV investigative journalist Nuria Piera in her investigative show on Saturday, 22 June 2019, presents many questions the Police and Attorney General version leave unanswered. Piera asks why the hitman would wait for Dial Bar to fill up with patrons when his alleged target, Sixto David Fernández was hanging out there for two hours before the crowds and the arrival of David Ortiz?
CNN journalist Patrick Oppmann was shut up by Attorney General Jean Alain Rodríguez when he referred to a clause in a Monday, 17 June 2019 prosecutor request for pretrial custody against Gabriel Alexander Perez Vizcaino (El Hueso), one of the 11 under arrest in the case, that referred to David Ortiz being followed by the criminals. Radio talk show host Marino Zapete airs the incident. After that question, Rodriguez would practically close the floor to more questions. Subsequently, the Attorney General would send an explanatory letter to Oppman citing the pretrial custody document was written before the new evidence that convinced the authority Ortiz was not the target.
Meanwhile, in Boston, Tiffany Ortiz, wife of David Ortiz shared that her husband was moved out of the intensive care unit at Massachusetts General Hospital. Tiffany Ortiz said in a statement released by his former team, the Boston Red Sox: “He remains in good condition and continues to recover under the care of Drs. David King and Larry Ronan.”
Source: DR1, Nbcnews
June 24, 2019
Seasonal ban: Protect the lobsters, conch and crabs
Environmental prosecutors seized thousands of pounds of seafood during an operation this week. In the National District alone, reports are that 2,100 lbs of lobster, crab and two Hawksbill Turtle fins were confiscated. A press release from the Attorney General Office reports that eight city restaurants were inspected in the operation.
The Dominican Republic is a signatory of Caribbean seasonal ban on the sale of the species to give the species time to reproduce.
Source: DR1, Pgr.gob
June 24, 2019
Greater Santo Domingo seeks to be named to the Unesco Creative City Network
A delegation from the Ministry of Culture traveled to France to present the candidatures of three Dominican cities for the creative cities network of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Culture Minister Eduardo Selman heads the Dominican delegation. He will be joined in Paris by Dominican ambassador to UNESCO, José Antonio Rodríguez. The sessions will be held from 19 to 23 June 2019.
On 28 May, the Dominican Republic had announced the nomination of three of the country’s cities to be part of UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network. The official presentation of the candidatures will take place at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris.
The Ministry of Culture is presenting the candidacies of Greater Santo Domingo (National District, Santo Domingo North, East and West, jointly) for Creative City of Music, southeastern San Pedro de Macoris for Creative City of Gastronomy, and northcentral Salcedo for Creative City of Crafts and Popular Arts.
The UNESCO Creative Cities Network is an initiative launched in 2004 to strengthen cooperation among cities that have recognized creativity as a strategic factor of sustainable development in economic, social, cultural and environmental aspects.
It covers seven creative fields: crafts and popular arts, digital arts, design, cinema, gastronomy, literature and music.
Source: DR1, Cultura.gob
June 24, 2019
Punta Cana is world capital for Venezuelan “maduristas”
According to the Spanish newspaper, El Mundo, the Punta Cana beach area, together with Miami and Madrid, attract the most of the Venezuelan elite (boliburgueses) that are backers of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. El Mundo explains that the areas are operation centers for the network of business and financial channels created by the Venezuelans to elude international sanctions.
In contrast, El Mundo says the country is also hosting thousands of Venezuelans who have migrated to the Dominican Republic after the Venezuelan economy collapsed, together with the Venezuelan high-level government officials and business people. El Mundo estimates that the so-called “desesperados” that numbered 3,400 in 2012 have increased to around 40,000.
The paper states that the numbers include businessmen who help the Maduro government to avoid international sanctions and to become more prosperous, in addition to Venezuelans who fled from the hunger in their own country and are surviving as illegal immigrants, many on the streets.
Source: DR1, Elmundo
June 24, 2019
Autopsies of American tourists show natural deaths
The autopsies carried out on US tourists David Joseph Harrison and Robert Bell Wallace determined that both died of natural causes. They died in 2018 and 2019 in separate incidents while staying at the Hard Rock resort in Punta Cana.
According to the autopsy carried out on 15 July 2018 on 45-year old Harrison, his cause of death was grade IV atherosclerosis, which led to a heart attack producing pulmonary edema and cessation of breathing.
He was taken to the Hospiten Medical Center in Bavaro on 14 July 2018 having been attended by doctors at the hotel complaining of several hours of chest pain.
The autopsy of 67-year-old Robert Wallace revealed that he died of septic shock, acute pneumonia and multi-organ failure. According to his wife, he began to have breathing difficulty, accompanied by severe lower back pain, having carried out physical activities some two days previously.
The Ministry of Public Health says that 53-year old Leyla Cox who was staying at the Excellence Resort in Punta Cana also died of a heart attack. Public Health Minister Rafael Sánchez Cardenas said that the deceased suffered from high blood pressure and cardiomegaly. She had suffered a heart attack in the past. Sánchez said the patient died when she was being taken by ambulance to a hospital in Punta Cana.
Sánchez Cardenas says that local medical records show there are fewer deaths of visitors this year than in 2018. So far this year there have been six deaths, while in 2018 there were 24.
An editorial in El Dia criticizes the Dominican authorities for being slow in releasing factual information that would put an end to the string of rumors circulating in social media and the media abroad.
Source: DR1, Eldia
June 24, 2019
Last updated January 23, 2026 at 4:16 pm