A Florida man has been arrested for stealing nearly 200 ventilators that were meant to help critically ill COVID-19 patients in El Salvador, officials said.
Yoelvis Denis Hernandez is pictured in a photo released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He was arrested in Texas Thursday on a South Florida indictment for stealing 192 US Government ventilators that were being sent to El Salvador to help COVID-19 patients there.
In the August incident, Hernandez helped detach a trailer vehicle holding the ventilators from a tractor as it was parked at a warehouse parking lot in Boynton Beach, Florida, at 1:47 a.m, according to the criminal complaint. The truck driver subsequently reported the theft of the trailer, court documents state. Authorities later located most of the ventilators, according to court documents, the Southern Florida U.S. Attorney's Office said.