SANTO DOMINGO-. The baseball player Dominican suspended from Tampa Bay Rays, Wander Francodid not attend an appointment on Thursday before a prosecutor who is investigating him for an alleged relationship with a minor.
“If at 11:30, then they still don’t show up, then they were already summoned for 11 in the morning, then the work of the Public Ministry simply continues,” prosecutor Olga Diná Llaverías, head of the Directorate, told the press. National Children, Girls, Adolescents and Family.
On Tuesday, Dominican prosecutors and police showed up at Franco’s two properties in Baní, the baseball player’s hometown and located about 60 kilometers southwest of the capital, to request his appearance but they did not locate him.
Prosecutor Diná Llaverías waited for Franco and his lawyers in their offices but after half an hour of the appointment time she decided to continue with other matters.
On August 14, the Public Ministry of the Dominican Republic confirmed that Franco was being investigated in relation to some publications on social networks, which suggested that he had had a relationship with a minor. The Associated Press has not been able to verify the posts.
Franco would be taking advantage of the fact that not the lawyers who currently represent him were summoned, but rather others that he had disavowed, in order not to respond to the request.
The Associated Press had access to a document stating that lawyers Luz Díaz Rodríguez, Rosalina Trueba, Cristian Cabrera and Manuel Rodríguez were disempowered by Franco to represent him and therefore could not go with him to the prosecutor’s office on Thursday.
The document establishes that Franco was required by the authorities on December 27.
“What the criminal process makes available, which are several options, right now is not the right time to talk about it,” responded prosecutor Diná Llaverías about the next steps in the case.
Franco was suspended with pay in August by Major League Baseball while authorities in his home country investigated him.
The 22-year-old shortstop, selected to the All-Star Game, will receive pay and accrue service time while the leave measure remains in place, under the terms of an agreement with the players’ union, which does not establish a deadline for making a decision on whether Major League Baseball will impose a disciplinary sanction.
FOUNTAIN: AP
