Kin in dark about killing

A Ravena man was shot to death in Costa Rica last week, and his family knows little about the circumstances surrounding the incident.

Stephen Rutkiewicz, 52, was in Costa Rica helping to rehabilitate some property owned by a family friend when he was shot in the early morning hours Dec. 21 in the village of Brasilito, a community on the Central American country's west coast.

The family friend called to alert relatives to the tragedy. But the family has gleaned little information from Costa Rican police officials or from the U.S. Embassy there, said a member of the Rutkiewicz family who did not want to comment further.

Police officials from Costa Rica had not contacted the Coeymans police or Albany County Sheriff's Office about the homicide.

A story in the Tico Times, a weekly English language newspaper in Central America, said Rutkiewicz was sitting in a car outside a bar when he was shot. He then drove to another bar nearby, where he bled to death waiting for an ambulance to arrive, according to a bouncer at the bar the Tico Times interviewed and who wanted to remain anonymous.

The newspaper also reported that there was a woman in Rutkiewicz's car, and that there was a man who jumped out of the back seat and ran after the shooting.

Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple said he got confirmation of Rutkiewicz's death from one of he slain man's brothers. Rutkiewicz, a graduate of Ravena-Coyemans-Selkirk High School, previously had a roofing business that specialized in the replacement of slate roofs. He was visiting Costa Rica a few times a year and staying with the close family friend.

Apple said in his time as sheriff, the department has never dealt with a murder that happened outside the U.S.

An official from the U.S. Embassy in Costa Rica Sunday said he did not have any information about a murder investigation involving a U.S. citizen.

Arrangements are pending until Rutkiewicz's body is returned to the United States, family members said.

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Kin in dark about killing