Journalist Cristian Herrera, who was killed in the border city of Cúcuta in June, had been investigating alleged ties between a congressman and the head of a local criminal organization.
The congressman, Luis Ariel Rodríguez of Norte de Santander, is cousins with two suspects in Herrera’s killing, according to Caracol Radio.
The suspected crime boss, identified by Caracol Radio as David Rolando Vivas, known as El Faraón or El Fantasma, has been linked to several killings along the Colombia-Venezuela border, including those of two businessmen and a human rights defender.
Herrera had contributed to a series of investigations in the news outlet Connects into the worsening crisis along the Colombia-Venezuela border. One of those reports was a detailed profile of the man known as El Faraón, who has kept a low public profile despite being linked to using gambling operations to launder money and controlling multimillion-dollar businesses on both sides of the border.
