Southwest charcoal traffickers get jail time, lose truck

Santo Domingo. – Agents of the Environment Ministry Bahoruco Province office made two arrests for the illegal transport of 148 sacks of charcoal, said Army major general Francisco Ventura.

Quoted by newspaper El Dia, the senior officer said Marcelo Santana and Cantina Baez were charged in the Bahoruco judicial department, which sent the accused to three months in prison to await trial.

He said after their arrest for transporting the charcoal on a Daihatsu truck the two were sent before Environment Defense prosecutor Bolivar D’Oleo.

Ventura added that Santana and Báez, being held at the fort Cambronal in the town of Neiba, were caught at a checkpoint manned by soldiers assigned to the National Environmental Protection Service (SENPA), which confiscated the truck.