Damián Valdez-Galloso is the alleged killer of El Taiger, Miami police conclude

November 3, 2024

Miami-Dade Police reported that Damián Valdez-Galloso, identified from the beginning as a "person of interest in the case" of El Taiger's murder, was the one who shot the popular reggaeton artist in the forehead. El Taiger died on October 10th.

"We are working closely with the State Attorney's Office to ensure the correct charge in this incident, so that Damián faces justice for the crime he committed," said Manuel Morales, chief of police, at a press conference.

Authorities affirmed that Valdez-Galloso, arrested last Tuesday in New York, "is the only individual involved" in the incident, which, according to police, occurred in Hialeah and not near Jackson Memorial Hospital, as was believed until now.

For Valdez-Galloso, 49 years old, a resident of Hialeah, also known as 'El Narra', authorities were offering 5 thousand dollars for any information that would lead them to him, who remained hidden until Tuesday afternoon.

On October 3rd, El Taiger was found in Miami inside a vehicle. He had been shot in the head. Since then he remained at Jackson Memorial Hospital in that city, where he stayed in critical condition on life support.

According to reports, he was shot in the forehead and the bullet exited through the right side of his head, which always suggested significant brain damage that put his life at high risk.

El Taiger's body was found on NW 9th Avenue and 17th Street, near the hospital where he died.

His ashes were transported to Havana last Friday. Dozens of followers said their final goodbye to the singer, who first attended a ceremony at the headquarters of the cultural center El Sauce, of Artex, and then accompanied the funeral procession to the Colón Cemetery.

The artist's cousin, musician Jorge Junior Hernández, was in charge of transporting and repatriating El Taiger's ashes, a decision that, as he explained on social networks, was based on what the popular rapper would have wanted, "final rest alongside his parents in Cuba."

The Cuban Institute of Music reported this Friday that at "family request," Carbajal's ashes would be honored in an "intimate ceremony, in the Juan Formel room, of the state cultural center El Sauce in Havana and will subsequently be placed in the Colón necropolis."