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Residents of the Canasí neighborhood in Santiago de Cuba captured a young man last Saturday, who is believed to be a member of the gang known as 'Matotones de Canasí', as he was transporting stolen sheep meat in a wheelbarrow along the road to El Caney, behind the EIDE Capitán Orestes Acosta.
The suspect reportedly used his own father's wheelbarrow to transport the stolen goods, according to independent journalist Yosmany Mayeta Labrada, who posted on his Facebook wall.
The arrest was not carried out by the police, but rather by the neighbors and family members from the area, who acted on their own in response to what they describe as a systematic and unprecedented police inaction.
The gang has been operating for over a decade in Canasí, with tentacles extending to Sevilla, El Caney, Abel Santa María, Zacateca, and Micro 1-B, according to the documented history by residents.
Between May 2024 and the date of the capture, the gang has left a trail of violence and theft and slaughter of livestock that includes three horses, three calves, four sheep, and two heifers stolen from farmers, home invasions, and acts of extreme violence.
Additionally, a guard sustained serious injuries while trying to protect oxen from an agricultural theft, a house was stripped of all its belongings, and an elderly man died under circumstances that have not yet been clarified on a nearby hill.
On the Friday before the arrest, 12 sheep disappeared on the same road where the suspect was captured a few hours later.
The most alarming aspect for the community is the institutional response: more than 20 formal complaints to the Police have gone unanswered, with no investigative follow-up, no strategy, and no judicial outcomes or sanctions.
Some residents suspect that the inaction of the authorities in El Caney, Abel Santamaría, and Sevilla is not coincidental, and they point to possible connections between law enforcement officials and the criminal network—something that has not been confirmed, but the repeated impunity fuels these suspicions.
The detained individual is identified as merely the weakest link in an organization made up of men and women who continue to operate with complete freedom in the area, and local residents fear that the thefts will escalate due to police inaction.
This case is not an isolated incident.
The Cuban Observatory of Citizen Auditing recorded 323 verified crimes in Santiago de Cuba in 2025, with a national increase of 115% in total crimes compared to 2024 and a rise of 479% in thefts compared to 2023.
The decline in public safety coincides with the desertion of approximately 20% of police personnel in the past year, alongside an economy that contracted by 5% in 2025, accumulating a drop of 15% since 2020.
In the absence of the State, Cubans are increasingly turning to popular justice.
This week, workers at a hospital in Santiago de Cuba cornered and captured a thief, in a pattern that is recurring throughout the Island.
The community demands that this case not be closed, that it be investigated, that those responsible be named, and that Canasí no longer lives in fear.
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