Body of Gang Leader Stolen from Grave in Ecuador

Ecuadorian police announced that the body of a gang leader disappeared from its resting place in a graveyard in Colombia, where he was found murdered in May. No one claimed the body. The remains of Junior Roldan were placed in a mausoleum in the Colombian town of Envigado. He was the second-in-command of the "Los Choneros" gang, a prison gang that terrorized Ecuador. He had fled to Colombia after surviving two previous assassination attempts in Ecuador. His body was found with gunshot wounds to the head in a wooded area on May 6. Police suspect he was killed by his bodyguard, who wanted to steal the large sum of money the gang leader had taken with him when he escaped, but no one has been arrested in connection with his murder. On Tuesday, workers found the graveyard gate open, and when they searched the ground, they noticed that one grave was empty. Officials later confirmed that the relevant mausoleum contained the body of Junior Roldan. The police told local media that "a number of men broke into the cemetery during the night and took the body." After several of its members were imprisoned, the "Los Choneros" gang became one of the most powerful prison gangs in Ecuador, controlling many aspects of life inside the country’s prisons and directing criminal operations from behind bars. The gang is believed to have been behind some of the most brutal clashes in Ecuadorian prisons, in which dozens of inmates were killed and sometimes beheaded.