Venezuela police to be revamped after shooting
Mar 23, 2012, 11:44 PM
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s government has announced plans to revamp a police force whose officers shot and killed the daughter of a Chilean diplomat.
Justice Minister Tareck El Aissami says the judicial police will be radically restructured, although he hasn’t released details of the plan. He says the force’s officers committed serious errors that he calls “unjustifiable.”
In making the announcement Friday, El Aissami didn’t refer directly to the March 16 shooting death of 19-year-old Karen Berendique by police in the city of Maracaibo.
She was shot at an unmarked police checkpoint. Her brother, who was driving, has said he thought the officers were robbers and backed up, at which point the police opened fire.
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