Two Former MLB Players Accused of Drug Trafficking in the Dominican Republic

Former Major League Baseball (MLB) players Octavio Dotel and Luis Castillo were members of a large drug trafficking ring recently dismantled in the Dominican Republic, Attorney General Jean Alain Rodriguez informed Tuesday.

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The 45-year-old Dotel, who pitched for a then-record 13 different MLB teams in his career, has already been arrested, Rodriguez said in a press conference.

Castillo, a 43-year-old former second baseman who won the World Series with the Florida Marlins in 2003, is still at large and is one of 18 suspects for whom arrest warrants have been issued, after seizing a 1,050-kilogram shipment of drugs going from South America to Puerto Rico with the help of the U.S. government and police agencies. 

The former baseball players were involved in the network of Cesar Emilio Peralta, also known as "Cesar the Abuser. Peralta, a fugitive, in turn, was part of the criminal organizations led by Rolando Florian Feliz, known as the “Pablo Escobar of the Caribbean,” who died in 2009.

The country's attorney general said the ring’s other leaders were Baltazar Mesa, Jose Jesus Tapia Perez, and Sergio Gomez Diaz, the latter two are under arrest.

Peralta “created a complex criminal organization,” Rodriguez said, adding that the gang leader laundered drug money “using numerous individuals from his family and social circle, including even national sports figures” like Dotel and Castillo.