- On April 15, 1996, a controversial kidnapping occurred in Caracas that captured the attention of the press, the police, and the authorities. It was a crime in which alias Hernancito, a well-known criminal of the time, participated
Newscasts in Venezuela began an urgent broadcast of a story that kept viewers on their toes for what would become one of the country’s most scandalous criminal acts of the 1990s.
On open television, citizens learned that a hostage situation was taking place in the Terrazas del Ávila urbanization in Caracas on the night of April 15, 1996.
The identity of the two men who intercepted two women in Chuao was initially unknown. They forced one of them, named María Magdalena Monagas, to board her vehicle and take them to her apartment located in Terrazas del Ávila, east of Caracas, while the other victim was released and immediately called the police. .
The initial intention of the criminals was to steal clothes and objects from the residence and flee the place. But everything got out of control when they came face to face with police officers as they left the apartment. This is how one of the most famous and tragic kidnappings in Venezuela began.
22 hours of kidnapping
The kidnappers began to play their cards. Inside the apartment, the sister of María Magdalena Monagas, named Lorena, was also held hostage. With their pistols loaded and pointed at the women’s heads, the subjects threatened to kill the hostages if the officials tried to enter the apartment.
The Technical Judicial Police (PTJ), now the Scientific, Criminal and Criminal Investigation Corps (CICPC), was present at the scene to start negotiations and get the kidnappers to release the women.
One of the criminals asked to speak with the authorities and demanded the presence of a television channel. That was how Commissioner José Ramón Lazo Ricardi and a Venevisión cameraman arrived at the door of the apartment to start a conversation with the hooded man who was pointing at one of the hostages. The moment was broadcast live on national television. The subject asked to be given a vehicle to escape from the place.
The unsuccessful operation was carried out throughout the night. The next morning the entire country knew about that kidnapping, which is why many Venezuelan political figures and curious people went to the vicinity of the building where the Monagas sisters lived.
However, the authorities obtained key information after several hours of kidnapping. The man who led that kidnapping was known in the Venezuelan criminal scene. It was Hernán Gregorio López Ortuño, alias Hernancito, a dangerous criminal of the decade who became known for participating in the murder of Venezuelan big league player Gustavo Polidor.
Hernancito had a sentence of more than 20 years in prison for the murder of the big league player. However, a few months later he escaped from the old Catia checkpoint and soon after he would be known again for being the protagonist of this kidnapping.
Hernancito gave himself up
Upon learning the identity of the kidnappers, the police searched for López Ortuño’s mother to take her to the place of the kidnapping and convince her son to turn himself in. The plan had the expected effect. Hernancito left the apartment with Lorena Monagas, handed over her weapon and was taken into police custody, but not before taking a moment to speak before the television camera that broadcast the entire scene live.
A few minutes later, the operation got out of hand. The other kidnapper who remained inside the apartment was enraged because he considered that Hernancito had betrayed him. At that moment, he opened the door and shot several times against the officials who remained in the corridor, in which three people were injured.
Thereafter contact was lost with the subject and the victim inside the apartment. For several hours the authorities tried to re-establish communications but there was no response. It was then that they decided to put an end to the kidnapping with a special operation.
Some agents entered through the windows and others stunned the kidnapper at the apartment door with an explosive. However, the element of surprise did not work. The subject was keeping an eye on the live television broadcast. When the officials entered, there was a shootout in which the kidnapper died and María Magdalena Monagas was seriously injured. The victim was transferred to the Domingo Luciani hospital where she died from the bullet wounds she received in the pelvis and another in the clavicle.
The way in which the authorities acted during the 22 hours that the kidnapping lasted and the role of the press was heavily criticized at the time. The country had not yet recovered from the kidnapping of the San Román Urological Center, which occurred in 1995 and left five people dead.
One of the details that most impressed the population, in addition to the police action that many described as unwise, was that a dangerous criminal like López Ortuño committed a crime again despite the fact that he was convicted of homicide.
Hernancito, a criminal with a career and cunning
The name of Hernán Gregorio López Ortuño has a place in the criminal history of Venezuela. The criminal lawyer and criminologist Luis Izquiel explained for The newspaper that alias Hernancito was a “career and very cunning” criminal.
He was a subject who only knew how to live off crime and that shows through the extensive police record. In addition, it is publicly known that every time he was released from prison he committed another crime shortly after. He was a professional criminal, who lived with crime in his mind and did not know how to do anything other than attack people, mainly robbery and kidnapping ”, explains Izquiel.
Indeed, Ortuño had a long criminal career. His name came to the fore after participating in the attempted robbery and murder of Gustavo Pulidor, for which he was sentenced to more than 20 years in prison. He was serving his sentence at the Catia checkpoint in Caracas when he escaped from the prison in the middle of the night. Shortly after, he would be known about the events of Terrazas del Ávila.
Marco Tulio Quintero Flores, alias Marquito, was the one who shot Gustavo Polidor in his garage for resisting the robbery. The murder occurred on April 28, 1995 in front of two of his children and his wife. Hernancito was part of the group that committed the crime.
After he turned himself in to the police on April 16, he was sent to serve the rest of his sentence at the Venezuelan General Penitentiary (PGV). However, in 2015, Hernancito obtained a “protected trust regime” measure that allowed him to enter and leave prison. The offender violated the measure granted to him and escaped from jail, for which the Prosecutor’s Office issued an arrest warrant.
After escaping again, in 2018 Hernancito was involved in another kidnapping. According to the police authorities, the criminal was the one who organized the kidnapping of a merchant of Syrian origin. Along with his accomplices, the subject asked the victim’s relatives for $700,000 and jewelry to free the man. After the relatives filed the complaint, they agreed with the authorities to give the kidnappers a controlled payment to free the merchant. However, Hernancito did not release the victim. Authorities rescued the man three days later in Carapita, Caracas but were unable to capture the López Ortuño.
Ability to establish links
The specialist affirms that Hernán López Ortuño was trained at a time in Venezuela where there were not as many forms of organized crime as today. In the crimes in which he was involved, he acted with one or two other people.
“Today, a criminal like him with that experience, violence, and even leadership, would surely have formed a large gang, because crime in Venezuela is usually organized today. At that time there were hardly those gangs that there are today of 50 or 100 individuals that dominate an entire neighborhood”, he comments.
When this criminal escaped from the Catia checkpoint, he did so with the support of some custodians. The criminologist highlights the ability of López Ortuño to establish links with criminals inside the jail and with some authorities.
In 2015, while the information was spreading that Hernancito had escaped from the PGV, the authorities of the Ministry of Penitentiary Affairs together with the directors of the prison interviewed Hernán López Ortuño in a video to deny that the prisoner had escaped from the prison. However, a few months later the leak was confirmed.
In the case of Terrazas del Ávila, the criminal astutely asked the authorities for the presence of the media at all times. According to Izquiel, this was a strategy by Hernancito to avoid an extrajudicial execution or for officials to simulate a confrontation.
“The guarantee that he was looking for was that if the media and some personalities were there, they had to respect his life. Then he saw how he defended himself in prison, as he had already done, ”he explains.
The criminal requested the presence of different high-ranking officials from that time, but there were also other political figures who came to the place. Izquiel affirms that the presence of so many people in the area of the kidnapping was intended, in part, to guarantee that the massacre of the Urológico San Román would not be repeated, a case that was characterized by police lack of coordination.
Hernancito died in 2018 during an alleged confrontation in Artigas with the State security forces. This occurred three months after the kidnapping of the Syrian trader.
The name of Hernán López Ortuño remains in the memory of the Polidor family for participating in the murder of the big leaguer and father of three children. He will always live in the memory of Lorena Monagas for being the man who kidnapped her and who caused the situation in which her sister died. The kidnapping of Terrazas del Ávila was classified as a massacre that highlighted the criminal history of Venezuela