Federal prosecutors ask judge to detain murder suspect

Federal prosecutors are asking a judge to detain Rosniel Diaz-Bautista without bond while he awaits trial for the murder of 24-year-old Indierra Morales, who was shot to death on Sept. 8 in Frederiksted.

In a motion for detention, Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Huston argued that Diaz-Bautista “is a danger to the community,” with three other pending criminal cases in V.I. Superior Court. “Moreover, the underlying homicide and killing of Indierra Morales was committed approximately two and a half months after the defendant was released from custody to a third-party custodian with a GPS monitoring device on his 2022 Attempted Murder case on June 18, 2024,” Huston wrote.

Following Morales’s murder, V.I. Police said witnesses and video evidence pointed to Diaz-Bautista, who was arrested and charged with local crimes. U.S. Attorney Delia Smith recently announced that additional federal charges had been filed against Diaz-Bautista, including use of a firearm during a crime of violence resulting in death, and discharge of a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence.