Dominican wanted in the U.S. linked to opposition candidate(Update)

Santo Domingo. – The National Police arrested an alleged drug trafficker wanted in extradition in the United States since 2008, but who was set free by the Supreme Court May 2009 despite that the procedure hadn’t concluded, and who is linked to opposition PRD party candidate Hipolito Mejia, through the “Movimiento Nuevo Renacer con Papá,” (movement new rebirth with Papa).

The extraditable Oscar E. Rodriguez Cruz, 46, is charged with supplying an unspecified amount of cocaine from Dominican Republic to a ring in New York and Boston.

The Supreme Court Penal Chamber ruled to release Rodriguez until prosecutors submitted documents of wiretaps with a judicial order. The case had been in a sort of limbo, until the Supreme Court again issued an arrest warrant February, to resume the extradition hearing.

The authorities however hadn’t detained him since, despite that he had continued to live in the same residence and headed his numerous businesses, which include auto dealers, stores and gas stations.

The Penal Chamber called the request “sui generis” in 2009 because Rodriguez was repatriated in 1995 and hadn’t traveled since. The charges alleged that he conducted drug trafficking operations specifically from Dominican territory.

The extraditable has dozens of posters with pictures of he and Mejia, in front of a building under construction on the 30 de Mayo Av. (Malecon), in the sector of the same name.

POSTERS COME DOWN

News channel CDN 37 reports Monday that all "Llego Papa" posters were taken down in the site on the Malecon early Monday.