Peruvian police officers accused of kidnapping and stealing more than $30,000 in broad daylight in Juliaca

An 18-year-old woman in Juliaca, in Peru’s Puno region, accused three police officers of kidnapping her and stealing money after she exchanged more than $30,000 to help her family buy a vehicle.

Sujey Slim Cárdenas Ramírez said the officers stopped her in the city center on Thursday, September 3. Security camera footage reportedly showed two officers getting out of a police vehicle while she was speaking on the phone and questioning what she carried in her backpack. They then put her in patrol car KR-27503.

According to her statement to anti-corruption prosecutors, the officers did not take her to a police station. Instead, they drove her to several locations and threatened to investigate her for money laundering unless she handed over part of the cash. Feeling vulnerable in an isolated area, she allowed them to search her backpack, and she said they removed about $15,000.

The woman said the officers then let her out. As she walked away, masked men on a motorcycle snatched the backpack containing the remaining money. She believes plainclothes officers followed the patrol car and completed the robbery. She also believes she had been followed from the moment she exchanged the money.

She reported the case at Juliaca’s central police station, where anti-corruption prosecutor Christhian Derly Arenas Velásquez appeared. Second Lieutenant Sebastián Jafet Romero Sánchez also came to the station. Cárdenas identified him as the officer who had pressured her to hand over the money, and he was arrested in flagrante. Two other officers named in the complaint had not been located.