Rolfy Ferreyra Cruz, 25, who police say has confessed to being the gunman, is believed to have been involved in two robberies in New Jersey. Police say the alleged shooter was paid $7,800 to carry out the hit
An alleged gunman and five accomplices have been detained in the shooting of former Red Sox superstar David Ortiz, Dominican officials said Wednesday, while providing no information about why a group of young men would try to kill their country’s most beloved sports hero.
Four other suspects were also being pursued in the shooting, which witnesses said was carried out by two men on a motorcycle, assisted by two other groups of people in cars.
Dominican authorities said on Wednesday the person behind the shooting of Ortiz was offered 400,000 Dominican pesos, or about $7,800, to carry out the hit.
Speaking at a press conference in Santo Domingo, Police Maj. Gen. Ney Aldrin Bautista Almonte, the director of the Dominican Republic’s National Police, declined to provide a motive for the shooting, but did say that at least five suspects are in custody.
He added that the alleged coordinator is one of the suspects detained.
However one of the suspects still at large, 31-year-old Luis Alfredo Rivas Clase, is reportedly wanted for an attempted murder in Pennsylvania. That incident, in which a male victim was hit in the back but survived, took place in Reading in April of last year, according to NBC 10.
Rivas Clase was charged with conspiracy to commit homicide, but it is unclear when or how he fled the state.
Police Maj. Gen. Ney Aldrin Bautista Almonte said the people behind the shooting of David Ortiz were paid $7,800. He is seen above at a news conference in Santo Domingo on Wednesday holding what investigators believe is the gun used to shoot Ortiz
Witnesses say Sunday's attack on David Ortiz was carried out by two men on a motorcycle and a group of people in two cars.
Authorities gave the name of the alleged shooter as Rolfy Ferreyra Cruz, 25, aka Sandy.
The police chief said that Ferreyra has confessed to the crime.
Luis Alfredo Rivas Class, a seventh suspect, has yet to be arrested as authorities search for him. He is reportedly also a suspect in an attempted murder case in Pennsylvania from last April
Ferreyra is also wanted in New Jersey for allegedly taking part in two street robberies in Clifton, according to a report on NJ.com.
Clifton Police Detective Lt. Robert Bracken told the website he suspects the man who committed the robberies is the same one who confessed to shooting Ortiz, but said he needed to see Ferreyra's biographical information to be certain.
The other five suspects in custody have been identified as Joel Rodríguez de la Cruz Calamardo; Porfirio Ayendi Dechamps Vásquez, aka Nene; Eddy Vladimir Feliz García; Reynaldo Rodríguez Valenzuela; and Oliver Moisés Mirabal Acosta.
Luis Alfredo Rivas Class, a seventh suspect, has yet to be arrested as authorities search for him.
Prosecutors have said two men on the motorcycle were seen on security camera footage talking with other people in an Accent and a Hyundai in a nearby street before the shooting at a popular Santo Domingo bar on Sunday night.
The weapon allegedly used to shoot Ortiz is a Browning Hi-Power pistol, according to Dominican police
Dominican police released the mug shots of the six men in custody. Two of them - Eddy Vladimir Feliz García (left) and Oliver Moisés Mirabal Acosta (right) - are seen above
Two other men arrested in the shooting - Porfirio Ayendi Dechamps Vásquez (left) and Joel Rodríguez de la Cruz (right) - are seen above
Reynaldo Rodríguez Valenzuela, one of six men in custody, is seen in the above photo released by Dominican police
While Ortiz lived in Boston, he visited the Dominican Republic at least six times a year, where he crossed paths with a wide variety of figures from the country’s legitimate and illegal business worlds, according to friends.
Ortiz studiously avoided mixing with shady characters, but a law-enforcement official said on condition of anonymity that officials were investigating whether Ortiz may have formed some relationship or acquaintance during a trip here that, without his knowledge, set off the chain of events leading to his shooting.
Among the suspects in custody was the alleged shooter, identified by authorities as Rolfy Ferreyra, aka Sandy, a skinny, tattooed 25-year-old who officials said had confessed to the shooting.
In a statement, officials said the weapon used, a Browning Hi Power semi-automatic pistol, had been handed to suspect Oliver Moises Mirabal Acosta, then to suspect Porfirio Allende Dechamps Vasquez, AKA The Kid, who buried it in the garden of his home.
Both men have been arrested and the gun has been recovered.
Also under arrest were Joel Rodríguez de la Cruz, aka Squiddy; Reynaldo Rodríguez Valenzuela, aka The Chinaman; and the suspected driver of the motorcycle, Eddy Vladimir Feliz García, aka The Package.
Many were caught in the same clothes they were seen wearing on surveillance video, Bautista said.
The four suspects still at large were identified as Luis Alfredo Rivas Clase, aka The Surgeon, as well as a woman known as The Venezuelan, or Red, and two other men, prosecutors said in a statement.
Meanwhile, in Boston, Ortiz’s wife said in statement that the former Red Sox star was able to sit up and take some steps as he recuperates in the intensive care unit at Massachusetts General Hospital.
The Dominican Republic’s chief prosecutor Jean Alain Rodríguez Sánchez spoke at a news conference on Wednesday.
Earlier on Wednesday, local police said the attack on Ortiz in the Dominican Republic was a sophisticated hit-job involving two cars which staked him out before he was shot by a man on a motorcycle.
Ortiz, 43, was shot in the back on Sunday night as he had drinks with a friend at the Dial bar in Santo Domingo.
Dominican prosecutors said in a court document that one of the suspects, Mirabal Acosta, had been seen driving the Accent before mounting a motorcycle driven by 25-year-old Feliz García.
'In one of the videos it was possible to observe both the accused and the shooter planning the commission of the incident right on Octavio Mejía Ricard Street, which is parallel to the place where the event took place,' prosecutors said in the court document.
Feliz Garcia, 25, was driving the motorcycle with the shooter on the back. He is shown being transferred from one police station to another on Tuesday night. He was savagely beaten by a crowd at the scene of the shooting
The document said Feliz García, the driver, was captured after he skidded and fell off his bike as the two tried to flee.
An enraged group of people captured Feliz García and beat him severely before handing him over to the police.
Mirabal Acosta was captured Tuesday night in Mao, in the northern Dominican Republic.
Feliz García’s lawyer said his client, who has been charged with being an accomplice to attempted murder, is an innocent motorcycle taxi driver who had no idea his passenger was going to commit a crime.
'He didn’t know what they were going to do. He’s a fan of David’s,' the lawyer, Deivi Solano, said Tuesday.
Feliz Garcia has now been charged with a slew of charges including attempted murder but his lawyer says he is an innocent moped taxi driver who had no clue what Acosta was planning.
Police are yet to confirm a motive but multiple law enforcement sources told DailyMail.com earlier this week that the hitmen were hired by a reputed drug lord who believed Ortiz, who is married, was having an affair with his wife.
The baseball star's representatives dismissed that it was over a woman but said they had no doubt it was a contract job.
Ortiz was flown back to Boston on
