Wilson Ramos kidnapping: Family and friends wait and pray

“Everyone came out into the street, and it was filled with people until 3 a.m.,” she said. “People cried. People prayed.”

The police here have said little, though a Twitter feed reported without elaboration that Ramos is alive. “State law enforcement officials confirm ballplayer Ramos alive,” it said. The Nationals and Major League Baseball said the league’s Department of Investigations was working in concert with Venezuelan authorities.

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The government sent top investigators Thursday to hunt for Washington Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos, whose abduction has shaken Venezuela's elite athletes and focused attention on the nation's sharp rise in kidnappings for ransom. (Nov. 10)

“Our foremost concern is with Wilson Ramos and his family and our thoughts are with them at this time,” MLB and the Nationals said in a joint statement. The statement said the ballclub and league had “been instructed to make no further comment.”

In a news conference Thursday morning, Justice Minister Tareck El Aissami announced that police had discovered the vehicle the armed men had used to abduct Ramos, a vital find he said could net important clues. The car was found in the town of Bejuma, about 25 miles west of this industrial city in central Venezuela.

He also said evidence collection teams had been at the scene of the abduction and that the “best kidnapping investigators” had been assigned to the case.

The abduction was felt far beyond the Santa Ines district, where Ramos was last seen. Media coverage has been intense in Venezuela, a country that is both obsessed with baseball and its stars and also painfully aware of the growing scourge of kidnappings and other violent crimes.

The U.S. State Department, which in the past has criticized drug trafficking through Venezuela, is monitoring the case but has not been contacted by Venezuelan authorities or Major League Baseball, a State Department spokesman said.

Ramos’s kidnapping was a blow to the Venezuelan baseball league, which is in the midst of its winter season, when a number of Venezuelan players who are on MLB teams return to play in their homeland. The kidnapping of Ramos, the first of a major league player here, led some Venezuelans to call for the suspension of at least Thursday’s games.

The league, though, rejected the idea.

And so the games went on. Some players chose not to play, longtime Venezuelan baseball official Enrique Brito said. But most stayed. Nationals backup catcher Jesus Flores, who occupied the locker next to Ramos this year in the Nationals’ clubhouse, was in the lineup for Magallanes, batting fifth as the designated hitter.

Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Barry Enright, an American playing for La Guaira, tweeted a picture of the green ribbon players wore on their sleeves to support Ramos. At one Venezuelan winter league game, in Anzoategui, a banner hung in the stands that read, “Liberen A Wilson” — in English, “Free Wilson.”

About a dozen players who played in the Nationals’ organization in 2011, mostly minor leaguers, remained in Venezuela, where they are playing for their winter ball teams.

Minor league pitcher Ryan Tatusko, one of the Nationals’ players in Venezuela, said the Nationals called him first thing Thursday morning to ensure he was safe. The Nationals are going to inform him “ASAP” if he is to stay or leave the country, Tatusko said.

Back at the Ramos family home, a full day after the abduction, family and friends of the ballplayer said they were hoping for the best.

“There is sadness and worry, of course,” said Marfa Mata, a friend of Ramos and also his spokeswoman. “But we also are hoping for a happy ending.”

kilgorea@washpost.com

Staff writer Karen DeYoung contributed to this report. Kilgore reported from Washington.