A pregnant mother-of-three was gunned down by an off-duty police officer in the Dominican Republic after she reportedly fled the scene of a hit-and-run accident, sparking mass outrage in the Caribbean nation.
Leslie Rosado, 36, was killed by police corporal Janli Disla Batista in the town of Boca Chica on Saturday night after she left her father’s birthday party.
According to a preliminary police report, Rosado rear-ended Disla Batista’s motorcycle, knocking him, his wife and their children to the pavement and sped away.
‘The corporal, while chasing the vehicle, fired the shots that caused this unfortunate event,’ National Police spokeswoman Ana Jiménez Cruceta said Sunday.
Leslie Rosado was shot and killed by off-duty police officer Janli Disla Batista on Saturday night in Boca Chica, Dominican Republic. Police said Rosado allegedly rear-ended Disla Batista’s motorcycle, knocking him, his wife, and two children to the ground. The cop hailed a biker and chased after Rosado while a police truck following them before he eventually opened fire and killed her. He remains under arrest
A surveillance camera shows Leslie Rosado driving down a Boca Chica, Dominican Republic, street as she was being pursued by an off-duty cop after she reportedly rear-ended him and fled the scene
Off-duty police office Janli Disla Batista is on the back of a motorcycle as he chased after Leslie Rosado’s Mercedes Benz SUV before he gunned her down
The impact of the fatal shot fired by off-duty cop Janli Disla Rosado shattered the driver’s window of Leslie Rosado’s Mercedes Benz SUV before she died
Surveillance video showed Rosado driving her white Mercedes Benz SUV with Disla Batista and another individual he had flagged down chasing after her. A truck, which appears to be part of the police fleet, is also seeing trailing Disla and Rosado.
A witness, who remained anonymous, told Dominican newspaper Diario Libre, that Disla Batista furiously approached Rosado’s vehicle and started punching it before he stepped up to the driver’s side window and opened fire, striking her in the head.
‘When the policeman shoots and breaks the window of the jeep, which was dark (tinted), he realizes that it was a woman, he took her out on his arm and got on a motorcycle and took her to the municipal hospital,’ the witness said.
Disla Batista was placed under arrest at the hospital.
Rosado was driving back to her home in the National District when the incident first unfolded.
Another witness told newspaper Listin Diario that Disla Batista broke back window as the law enforcement agents looked on.
Off-duty cop Janli Disla Batista (pictured) was arrested at a Boca Chica, Dominican Republic, hospital where he rushed architectural engineer and married mother-of-three Leslie Rosado after he shot her Saturday night. The 36-year-old did not survive
Leslie Rosado was a married mother-of-three and was reportedly pregnant
‘The one who killed her came in civilian clothes and then a contingent came in a police truck and being here (at the scene) they were not able to arrest the guy with the aggressive action he had,’ he said.
Santo Domingo Este prosecutor Milcíade Guzmán and five other prosecutors from the local Attorney General’s Office inspected Rosado’s SUV and noticed that one of the tires had also been struck by a bullet.
A photo leaked on social media revealed a bullet hole near the rear license plate.
Leslie Rosado (right) with her father José Rosado at his yacht birthday party Saturday before she was gunned down
A photo leaked on social media revealed a bullet hole near the rear license plate.
‘There are other details that I want to keep for a matter of delicacy of the investigation that we were able to observer ourselves in the vehicle that indicate to us that this shot is not the product of an accident,’ Guzmán said. ‘In addition, you cannot tell the Dominican society that you touched a glass twice and that you (misfired) a shot because the weapon was tampered with and you did not know it. Because beforehand, the vehicle had another shot in a tire. It is evident that you were clear that the weapon was tampered with and you committed his violent act. So we, as the Prosecutor’s Office, (will go after him to the fullest extent of the law.’
Rosado was one of four sisters who followed the footsteps of her father and went on to become architectural engineers.
Her killing stirred memories of the evangelical pastor couple Elisa Muñoz, 32, and Joel Díaz, who were gunned down by police officers in the city of Villa Altagracia, 38 kilometers from Santo Domingo, the nation’s capital, on March 30, 2021.
An unarmed Robinson Ramón Méndez Mancebo, 27, was killed in a confrontation with National Police agents outside a bar on September 28 in Azua.
Lawyer Ramon Alexy Castillo was stopped in his vehicle August 10 for breaking COVID-19 curfew and got into an argument before he was shot dead by the police in San José de Ocoa.
The cops confused the vehicle the recently married couple were traveling in with a car that had been used by suspects to carry out a robbery earlier in the day in the city of Bonao.
First Lady Raquel Arbaje expressed her concern over Rosado’s shocking death and called for a reform of the police department.
‘My grief over the death of the mother and architect Leslie Rosado left me in ‘shock’ and I waited for the official investigations,’ Arbaje tweeted Monday. ‘Today I only say: NOTHING justifies what happened. Justice has its role in this case. Today I apologize to your mother, father, husband and children. Enough!
Former President Leonel Fernández also tweeted: ‘Shock and dismay over the death of the young mother #Leslie Rosado, architect, daughter of engineer and friend José Rosado. We ask for clarification of this regrettable fact that should not by any means go unpunished.’