Colombian police mentioned Monday {that a} reward had led them to the suspected killers of a famous Italian scientist whose dismembered stays have been discovered scattered across the Caribbean resort metropolis of Santa Marta in April.
Alessandro Coatti, 42, labored for Britain’s Royal Society of Biology as a science coverage officer whose job included giving proof to parliament, earlier than leaving that put up in 2024 to journey in South America.
A part of his physique was present in a suitcase on a riverbank on April 6. Different stays have been later present in different areas.
Coatti had arrived in Santa Marta, a metropolis that acts as a gateway to idyllic palm-lined Caribbean seashores and the snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountain vary, as a vacationer.
The police mentioned he was lured by a gang that deliberate to rob him to an deserted home within the metropolis, by means of a relationship app for the LGBTQ group.
Royal Society of Biology
El Tiempo quoted an area resort employee as saying Coatti was conducting analysis on native animal species and had requested about visiting the village of Minca, about six miles southeast of Santa Marta.
Santa Marta’s Mayor Carlos Pinedo mentioned Sunday that 4 folks suspected of his homicide and dismemberment had been arrested in raids within the Colombian capital Bogota, the second metropolis of Medellin in addition to in Santa Marta and the city of Arjona, close to the port metropolis of Cartagena.
At a press convention on Monday, Santa Marta police chief Colonel Jaime Rios mentioned that the police had acquired a tip-off, which led them to a home the place traces of blood have been discovered.
“By arduous investigative work, interviews have been carried out, organic traces belonging to the sufferer have been collected, and safety digital camera footage was analyzed, which have been all key to fixing the case,” he mentioned.
The grotesque killing of Coatti, described by colleagues on the Royal Society of Biology as a revered scientist, prompted shock in Colombia.
“He was a passionate and devoted scientist, main RSB animal science work, writing quite a few submissions, organizing occasions and giving proof within the Home of Commons,” the RSB mentioned in a assertion after Coatti’s dying. “Ale was humorous, heat, clever, cherished by everybody he labored with, and might be deeply missed by all who knew and labored with him.”
Pinedo had supplied a reward of $12,000 for data resulting in the seize of his killers.
Rios mentioned the reward had led to the breakthrough within the investigation.
The Sierra Nevada mountains are residence to a drug-running paramilitary gang often called the “Conquistadors of the Sierra Nevada.”
It’s not recognized if they’d any hand in Coatti’s homicide, however they’ve been linked to the homicide and dismemberment of others in recent times.
