Five jailed for covering up rapper’s murder

A forensic expert, three police officers and a music entrepreneur have been jailed for covering up the murder of Venezuelan rapper Canserbero in 2015.

Canserbero, who had been named best rapper in Spanish by Rolling Stone magazine, was drugged and stabbed to death by his manager, Natalia Améstica.

Améstica and her brother threw her body from a tenth-floor window.

The five people convicted Tuesday have been found guilty of helping the brothers stage the crime scene to make Canserbero’s murder look like a suicide.

They have been sentenced to prison terms of between 15 and 20 years.

Natalia Améstica and her brother Guillermo were already sentenced in February to 25 years in prison for murder.

The death on January 19, 2015 of Canserbero, whose real name was Tirone González, shocked the Venezuelan rap scene.

At the time it was ruled that the 26-year-old star had killed his friend Carlos Molnar in a knife fight before jumping out of a window.

But in December 2023, Natalia Améstica confessed to stabbing both Molnar and Canserbero.

In a video statement released by Venezuela’s attorney general last year, she recounted what had happened that night.

Natalia Améstica claims that she got angry with the rapper after finding out that Canserbero no longer wanted her as his manager.

He described how Canserbero arrived at his apartment in the Venezuelan city of Maracay on January 19, 2015.

He was accompanied by his friend Carlos Molnar, who was also Natalia Améstica’s long-term boyfriend.

“The opportunity arose to make them tea,” he explained in the video, adding that he added a powerful tranquilizer to their drink.

When her drugged partner Carlos Molnar entered the kitchen, she stabbed him in the neck, back and arm.

Canserbero witnessed Améstica’s attack on her boyfriend but, under the effects of the drugs that Améstica had given him, he collapsed on the couch.

Améstica then proceeded to stab him twice.

“In desperation, I then called my brother Guillermo to help me resolve the situation,” she said in the video confession.

His brother arrived with the three agents of the Venezuelan intelligence agency, Sebin, who have already been sentenced.

“They finished arranging the scene so that it looked like a murder-suicide,” according to Natalia Améstica.

He said that the officials “stabbed Carlos (Molnar) a few more times, my brother Guillermo was stabbed four times. The rest was done by the Sebin officials.”

“Then they told us how to throw it out the window to complete the murder-suicide scene,” he said in his confession.

His brother Guillermo said that a forensic detective who arrived at the scene was suspicious and remarked that it seemed “manipulated.”

According to Guillermo Améstica, the forensic expert demanded a bribe of $10,000 (£7,880) in exchange for helping the brothers cover up the crime and make it appear that Canserbero had attacked Molnar before jumping out of the window.

The fifth convicted this Tuesday is Marcos Pratolongo, a music businessman who provided security at some of Canserbero’s concerts.

At the time of his arrest, Venezuela’s attorney general had said that Pratolongo was in possession of the keys to Canserbero’s apartment, from which important evidence had disappeared.

The attorney general posted on social media Tuesday that Pratolongo had been found guilty of complicity in Canserbero’s murder, but did not provide further details about his role in the crime.