By the
A.M. Costa Rica staff
Friday the Judicial Investigating
Organization reported that an U.S.
citizen identified as Harvey Lee
Bernstein, 65, had disappeared two
days before.
Monday the manager of the Barrio Amon*
hotel where Bernstein booked a
room confirmed that even though
man paid for the hotel room, he
never stayed there. Then Sunday
night the U.S citizen returned to
the hotel to request his passport
and luggage, the hotel manager
said.
The manager said Bernstein told
him that he was going to the
airport to take his flight back to
the U.S. at 2 a.m. on Monday. The
manager said he was responding to
the A.M. Costa Rica report on the
case.
“This is an update to a story you
released about a missing person,
Harvey Bernstein. He checked
in with us on Wednesday afternoon
but never ended up staying with us
and was reported missing by his
two friends the next
morning. Anyway, this
morning, about 12:30 a.m. I
received a call from our
receptionist that he was at the
hotel to pick up his passport,
travel bag and was going to the
airport for his 2 a.m. flight back
to the U.S.” said the hotel
manager.
The hotel manager requested that
his name and the hotel's name not
be revealed.
Where Bernstein stayed is a
mystery because even judicial
investigators never could reach
him to interview him.
After being alerted by a reporter,
the judicial investigation
organization confirmed that
Bernstein did leave the country to
the United States, as the hotel
manager said.
Bernstein arrived with two
friends. The trio had rooms
reserved at the Barrio Amon hotel,
but on Wednesday when the friends
could not find Bernstein they
reported him missing, judicial
agents had said Friday.
Still missing is another
foreigner, U.S. businessman
William Sean Creighton-Kopko, who
was kidnapped last Sept. 24.
As A.M. Costa Rica has been
reporting, eight Costa Ricans are
in pretrial detention for six
months in the case.
Five of them were detained in
Costa Rica: a man surnamed
Vega-Aguirre, a woman surnamed
Aguirre-Leal, a man surnamed
Martinez-Chacón, a man surnamed
Ford-Dauman and a woman surnamed
Sanabria-Abarca.
The
rest of suspects were detained
in Spain and are also in jail.
A Spanish court is handling an
extradition request by Costa
Rica. Those suspects were
identified as a man surnamed
Morales-Vega, a woman surnamed
Solis-Chaves and a woman
surnamed Vega-Aguirre.
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Judicial
Investigating
Organization courtesy
photo
Manager
of the hotel where
Bernstein booked
confirmed he paid
for the hotel room, but
he never stayed there.
The
men forced the
victim into the
pickup and drove to
a property in the
village of La
Trinidad in
Moravia* where
the leader’s
grandmother,
Aguirre-Leal was
living.
After taking the
victim to the
property in La
Trinidad in Moravia,
the suspects
communicated several
times with relatives
of the victim. At
first, they asked
for a ransom of $5
million, but a
payment of $950,800
was accepted. The
payment was made in
bitcoin currencies
in four different
accounts.
Once
the kidnappers
received the ransom,
all communication
between the suspects
and the victim’s
family ceased, said
investigators.
Investigators
theorize that
Creighton was
targeted for two
reasons. The victim
had a good income as
result of his
company of
sportbooks, and the
gang members knew
that the victim’s
business involved
bitcoin. They
probably thought
that transactions in
bitcoins were more
difficult to detect,
agents suspect.
Investigators
are trying to
establish what
happened to the
victim and are
continuing to
investigate new
possible sites. “We
are not going to
rest until we know
what happened to Mr.
Creighton. We hope
to find him alive,
but we must find him
in whatever
conditions he is,"
said Espinoza.
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Did the victim make a
mistake when driving
alone, which facilitated
the kidnapping? We would
like to know your
thoughts on this story.
Send your comments to: news@amcostarica.com
*Click on the
blue letters to reach
the place in google
maps.
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