Minnesota student, ‘person of interest’ in woman’s disappearance in Dominican Republic, is released

Joshua Riibe, the Minnesota college student who was detained in connection with a woman who went missing over spring break in the Dominican Republic, has been released and allowed to return to home, his attorney said.

“We are pleased to announce that Joshua and his father are currently traveling back to their home in the United States,” attorney Guzmán Ariza said in a statement released Wednesday night.

Ariza said Riibe’s release from police detention, interrogation and surveillance followed a court hearing on Monday, when a judge ruled that the St. Cloud State University student was free to leave the Caribbean island nation, where the search for 20-year-old Sudiksha Konanki has been ongoing since March 6 in the tourist town of Punta Cana.

The court proceeding stretched for five hours until Judge Edwin Rijo ruled that Riibe, classified as a witness in a disappearance case, should have full rights under Dominican law and unrestricted freedom of movement.

The prosecutor’s office notified Riibe, 22, that his passport was waiting for him to retrieve, but “while Joshua appreciated this decision, he chose, for privacy reasons, to apply for a new passport at the U.S. Consulate, which was promptly issued,” Ariza said.

Police said Konanki disappeared at a beach by her Riu Republica hotel before dawn on March 6. A hotel representative said there was a power failure at the time that prompted guests to head to the beach.

Law enforcement quickly classified Riibe as a “person of interest” because he was the last person to see Konanki alive.

According to the transcript of an interview with prosecutors, reported by Dominican media as well as NBC News and Telemundo, Riibe told police he was drinking with Konanki on the beach and they were kissing in the ocean when they got caught in a current. Riibe said he was a former lifeguard and helped bring her ashore.

He added that he vomited upon reaching the beach and that Konanki said she was going to fetch her things. When he looked up, she was gone. He said he was later surprised to hear of her disappearance.

On Monday, Konanki’s parents asked Dominican authorities to declare their daughter legally dead. Subbarayudu and Sreedevi Konanki said in a letter that after an extensive search, local authorities believe that Sudiksha drowned.

Sudiksha Konanki, a University of Pittsburgh student from the Washington, D.C., suburb of Chantilly, Va., and five friends had traveled to the Caribbean nation on March 3 for spring break. Riibe was not part of her travel party.

Riibe enrolled at St. Cloud State in 2023. He is from Rock Rapids, Iowa, about 10 miles south of the Minnesota border, and is majoring in land surveying and mapping sciences.

This story contains material from the Associated Press.