The owner of Jet Set, a popular nightclub in the Dominican Republic where 236 people died after the roof collapsed two months ago, was arrested on Thursday and charged with involuntary homicide, prosecutors announced.
Jet Set’s roof collapsed in the early hours of April 8 during a live concert, setting off a lengthy search-and-rescue operation and causing a national reckoning over the lack of building inspections nationwide.
The arrest occurred after a club employee came forward to the authorities with evidence that showed he had warned the club’s owners that they should cancel the concert because the roof was in such poor condition that it posed a danger.
The owner, Antonio Espaillat, a wealthy businessman whose family also owns a chain of radio stations, appeared before the attorney general’s office in the capital, Santo Domingo, on Thursday afternoon for questioning. He was detained afterward, his lawyer, Jorge Luis Polanco, said.
Mr. Espaillat’s sister, Maribel Espaillat, who helped manage the club, was also charged.
The attorney general’s office, which announced the arrests Thursday evening, said both siblings had been charged with involuntary homicide.
They “demonstrated immense irresponsibility and negligence by failing to do what was necessary to ensure that the Jet Set Club’s roof was adequately and expertly repaired,” the attorney general’s office said in a statement. The office also said the siblings had tried to “manipulate or intimidate” employees who would be potential witnesses, without offering further details.
Mr. Espaillat and his mother owned Jet Set, a storied disco a block from the shore in Santo Domingo. The club was known for live music Mondays, which were often filled with the city’s elite.
After years of repeated repairs, the club’s roof collapsed during a performance by the merengue singer Rubby Pérez, who was known as the “highest voice in merengue.”
Mr. Pérez died, as did many of his fans from his hometown. The victims included a Dominican governor, former Major League Baseball players and a family of prominent bankers. The city’s director of urban infrastructure was also killed, as was the minister of public works’ son.
In a local television interview two weeks after the tragedy, Mr. Espaillat acknowledged that the club’s ceiling panels often got soaked from water leaking from the air conditioning. Workers had replaced ceiling panels on the same day of the fatal concert, but he said that he had no idea the situation was so dire.
“The first thing I want to say is that I have a very great pain,” he said. “I regret all the losses with all my soul.”
But an employee later came forward with evidence that Mr. Espaillat had been warned. The employee turned his telephone over to investigators, Plinio Pina, the employee’s lawyer, told reporters in Santo Domingo on Wednesday.
“Our client presented, basically, evidence of conversations in which he gave an account of the situation at the nightclub in which he expressed his fears and apprehensions, and his suggestion that the event be suspended,” Mr. Pina told reporters. “And that was ignored.”
Satellite images showed a large amount of equipment, like air-conditioning condensers, on the club’s roof, which many experts say they believe contributed to the collapse. An engineering report that reviewed the tragedy was completed this week, but the contents have not been made public.
Dozens of lawsuits have been filed, many of them from the nearly 200 survivors.
Frances Robles is a Times reporter covering Latin America and the Caribbean. She has reported on the region for more than 25 years.
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