Gasoline prices reduced
slightly by regulator


The Autoridad Reguladora de los Servicios Públicos is cutting gasoline prices 35 colons a liter for super, 43 colons a liter for plus and 41 colons a liter for diesel, the agency said Friday.

The cut is not based on the plunging price of petroleum on the world market but because the Refinadora Costarricense de Petróleo government monopoly overestimated the effect on prices attributable to Hurricane Ike, which raged north in mid-September, the agency said.

Botched bus stickup
puts three men in jail


Three men tried to hold up an Alajuela bus driver in his bus Saturday night but someone, perhaps a passenger, called police. Officers surrounded the bus not far from Alajuela centro and forced the men to surrender.

One man had a knife he used to threaten the driver, said the Ministerio de Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública. They were identified by the last names of Espinoza, González and Mendoza. Two of the men are prohibited from entering Costa Rica, and all three were illegally in the country, officials said.They were turned over to immigration officials.

This was at least the fourth bus stickup in eight days. In the three other cases, bandits used guns, and one passenger died when he pulled his own gun Oct. 24.

Speedy court process lets
two robbers go rapidly


Two more robbers have received the benefit of conditional liberty after being convicted in the new Juicio de Flagrancia. But in a traditional court two robbers got seven years each.

In the first case a man with the last name of Ortega Pereira was found guilty of ripping a gold chain from the neck of a woman in San José centro Oct. 8. The woman was walking with her mother with the goal of getting on a bus to return to their home in San Rafael de Heredia. The woman, identified by the last name of Salas, did not react, but her mother did and grabbed the necklace back from the robber.  As the two scuffled, police arrived and captured the robber as he tried to escape. Ortega got two years but went free under conditional execution of the sentence.

The second case involved a man with the last names of  Acosta Naranjo. He followed a man who had just taken money from an automatic teller Oct. 23 and grabbed the wallet of the man as the victim walked in the public street. Acosta had the bad planning to do so in the vicinity of the San José court complex, and a vehicle containing Judicial Investigating Organization robbery agents that was passing by chased him some 600 meters. The agents captured him with the wallet still in his hand, court officials said. He received a year and nine months with conditional execution.

The flagrancia court was set up to handle criminals caught red-handed.

In the Tribunal Penal de Desamparados two men, identified by the last names of Espinoza Cascante and López Mendoza got seven years each last week for robbing a woman bus passenger Sept. 16, 2006, by threatening to cut the throat of her daughter, 6.  The crime happened in San Rafael Abajo de Desamparados. The men were caught when the victim drove around the area with Fuerza Pública officers and spotted her assailants. All three cases involved the crime of aggravated robbery.

20-year term upheld
in murder of expat here


A 20-year prison term has been upheld against a murderer who stabbed an American citizen to death in his Pavas apartment. The Sala III confirmed the sentence that was handed down by a panel in the Tribunal de Juicio de San José last Dec. 18.

The Costa Rican killer, a man with the surnames Jiménez Avendaño, was found guilty of the aggravated robbery and homicide of Mark Judson Watkins, a 58-year-old retiree who came to Costa Rica from Florida.

Watkins was found dead in his apartment in Rohmoser, Pavas, on the morning of Sept. 21, 2006, by his driver. He was lying on his sofa bed partially clothed, and had suffered three stab wounds to the body, investigators said at the time.
Investigations established robbery as the motive.