Missing persons alert for Ryan Torilal issued over a week after Leysner disappearance
More than a week after the disappearance of Rodney Leysner, a public missing persons alert for suspect Ryan Torilal had not been issued. The Suriname Police Corps published the alert on Wednesday.
Criticism of slow search for fleeing suspect in Leysner case
The disappearance of Rodney Leysner raises mounting questions about the conduct of the Public Prosecutor's Office and the police, De Ware Tijd reports. Central to the concern is the remarkable reluctance to publicly search for a suspect whom the authorities themselves have marked as a fugitive.
Leysner, a member of the board of directors of Rudisa, disappeared without a trace on 15 August. His family reported him missing. A few days later, the police announced that the investigation had taken a new direction: there were indications of a crime. The vehicle in which Leysner was last seen was found heavily damaged and crushed in a swamp on a site in Saramacca.
Four suspects have been identified in the case, with three remanded in custody: the Cuban spouses A.S. and N.Y.S., and the Surinamer E.R. A fourth suspect, initially identified only by the initials R.T., was named by police as a fugitive. It was later revealed that this is entrepreneur Ryan Torilal.
However, more than a week after Leysner's disappearance, there was still no general, nationwide missing persons alert with a photograph and personal details of Torilal circulated. No public appeal specifically requesting the population to watch out for him.
De Ware Tijd points out that in other serious crimes, such as the drive-by murder of entrepreneur Karan Chablani, police and the justice system quickly resorted to such measures. Suspects were then publicly sought by name, photograph, and other details. Why a different approach was taken in the Leysner case remained unclear.
According to the newspaper, selectivity — or even merely the appearance of it — undermines confidence in the rule of law. When every resource is immediately mobilised for one suspect and, despite the seriousness of the case, a far less visible approach is chosen for another, the question of what criteria are being applied inevitably arises. Questions about influence, status, connections, and possible preferential treatment naturally come to the fore.
Police and the Public Prosecutor's Office need not disclose every detail of an ongoing investigation, but society is owed transparency and consistency. If there is an investigative reason, a deliberate silent strategy, or a legal obstacle underlying the absence of a public alert, the Public Prosecutor's Office should clarify this to the extent that the interests of the investigation permit.
Postscript: On Wednesday at 13:45, the Suriname Police Corps posted an official missing persons alert for Ryan Kenneth Torilal on its website.
Source: De Ware Tijd