Bogota, Mar 13 (EFE).– The relatives of a Colombian police captain who revealed an alleged male prostitution network within the police force said that he was kidnapped on a highway in Norte de Santander province, local media reported.

Capt. Anyelo Palacios was abducted on Saturday evening by four men on two motorscooters as he was riding in a car through the La Miguelera sector on the highway between Cucuta, the capital of Norte de Santander, and the city of Pamplona.

The officer’s mother, Flor Alba Montero, said that Palacios was threatened with firearms and forced to get out of the car in which he was riding with another person, who was not kidnapped and who informed the family of the situation, according to the La Opinion daily.

Norte de Santander police chief, Col. John Jairo Aroca, said that an antikidnapping team will arrive in Cucuta on Sunday to “investigate the case.”

Palacios became surrounded by scandal after declaring himself a victim of a homosexual prostitution network within the police known as “The Community of the Ring,” which in mid-February cost police commander Gen. Rodolfo Palomino his job.

The situation sparked a national debate with the publication by La FM television of a videotape recorded in 2008 by Palacios in which he is having a highly sexual conversation with then Sen. Carlos Ferro.

Ferro, who since October 2014 had served as the vice minister of the Interior for Policy Relations, resigned his post after the video was made public, despite the fact that no mention was made in it of the presumed prostitution network.

The scandal was one of the reasons for Palomino’s Feb. 17 resignation amid a disciplinary investigation opened by Attorney General Alejandro Ordoñez. EFE