The Mayor of Medellín, Federico Gutiérrez, has submitted a proposal to the recently inaugurated Tourism Secretariat aimed at regulating short-term apartment rentals in the city. This initiative comes in the wake of mounting evidence suggesting that foreigners are exploiting private accommodations to sexually abuse vulnerable girls.
The most recent case involves a masonry worker from Arizona, Richard Opalinski. Colombian authorities, in collaboration with Libertas International and Homeland Security, apprehended Opalinski after he hosted parties within a Medellín Airbnb with underage girls. Colombia’s National Police revealed that Opalinski coerced young girls into performing sexual acts while administering drugs to facilitate their abuse. Incriminating evidence, including training bras and small girls’ clothing, was discovered in his short-term rental apartment.
Opalinski’s disturbing pattern of behavior revealed a calculated pursuit of exploitation, with over 60 trips to Colombia undertaken to seek out increasingly younger victims. The average age of these victims was 14. His modus operandi included soliciting pimps to get victims, underscoring the gravity of his criminal activities.
In response to Opalinski’s arrest, a member of the Colombian National Police emphasized the importance of dismantling criminal operations in the city. “Today we celebrate the capture of Richard Opalinksi. This coward traveled to Colombia to abuse the most vulnerable girls living in the city of Medellín. His arrest shows that he is not nearly as strong as he thinks he is when he is not abusing young girls,” stated the police official.
Another distressing incident involved a retired member of the U.S. military, Dominick Divencenzo, who was arrested for sexually exploiting girls in a rented apartment in La Floresta.
According to the local media outlet El Armadillo, Divencenzo arrived in Medellín in 2020 and swiftly “fell in love with Medellín.” Suspicions arose as neighbors reported disruptive behavior in the building he resided in, including noise complaints and the presence of unknown individuals, potentially minors, frequenting his apartment. While evidence implicating Divencenzo in sexual exploitation was not initially conclusive, subsequent legal proceedings have solidified the case against him.
But not all the victims are underage girls.
Last month, a 50-year-old Canadian allegedly murdered a 20-year-old single mother, Laura Lopera, inside a seven-bedroom apartment he had rented in Medellín. Wiseman is wanted for disposing the body of the young woman inside a suitcase next to the trash.
Lopera’s body was found after the apartment owner alerted the police of a “foul odor” inside her rental. Lopera had met Jesse Gilbert Wiseman on a dating site. The only suspect in Lopera’s murder left Colombia on February 9 for Guatemala, and despite evidence to suggest he may have returned to Canada, his whereabouts remain unknown. Interpol issued a Blue Alert for arrest shortly after Lopera’s body was identified inside Wiseman’s temporary Medellín apartment.
The proposed legislation to ban or regulate short-term rentals of properties in residential buildings and urbanizations is part of a larger city-wide crackdown by Mayor Gutiérrez against human trafficking and organized crime in the city, especially in popular tourism nightspots, such as Medellín’s Parque Lleras.
The proposal also looks to regulate which type of accommodation can be offered to visitors, after a rash of robberies and killings of foreigners inside their lodgings. During the last seven months,12 foreign nationals have died after being drugged with scopolamine during encounters with strangers they met through dating apps. The U.S. Embassy in Bogotá issued a stern warning to U.S citizens to avoid hook-ups on dating apps while in staying in Colombia.
Mayor Federico Gutiérrez’s hardline stance on organized crime and sexual exploitation of women made the cover of Colombia’s leading news magazine Semana with the title: “Fico’s War”. The article on Federico “Fico” Gutiérrez profiles his all-out persecution against powerful pimp mafias in Medellín, and a “painful world of drugs, sex and dollars, where girls are just merchandise.”
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