Complaint against judge who released 25 traffickers

A COMPLAINT has been lodged in the Supreme Court against  a judge  who halted proceedings against 25 alleged narco traffickers and allowed them to walk free.

The First Drug prosecutor  Markel Mora sent a letter on  July 4 to the president of of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ), Jose Ayu Prado, about the alleged “irregular” situation a ruling when  the Fourth Criminal Court quashed the case and ordered the release of 25 people involved in the drug trade

Mora  told Ayu Prado that  through failure on June 28, Fourth Criminal Court  judge Yoideth Chirú Manrique, decreed the “nullity of all proceedings and the case closed,” and ordered  the release of the suspects.

T he prosecutor said the  “surprise” ruling arrived in   his office at 4:05 pm on July 1however, in an on June 29 , the same judge ” had released 25 people allegedly charged in that case; including several who were not even formally detained in prison headquarters. The same situation operated with the release of  four women involved in the  process. “

The prosecutor told Ayu Prado that “it is questionable to enact contrary to the law, the  file of a  complex case consists of 16 volumes and over 7,273 pages of research so far; but the most  singular is the fact that freedoms conferred overwhelmingly, even against the resolution itself, since without being properly executed they turned and made effective non restrictions on freedom of movement of accused suspects”.

The prosecutor attached to the copy of the judgment, by which the judge declared the invalidity of the record in the investigation. Mora reported that he has appealed the decision of the Fourth Criminal Court before the Second Superior Court.

The investigation in the case began on March 4, 2015, after the Sensitive Investigations Unit of the Directorate of Judicial Investigation (DIJ) received reports on the operation of an international drug trafficking network

. In one of the raids, carried out on a  house in Bethania  they seized 25 kilos of cocaine and other documentation of its members and its operations.

In her  decision, Judge  Chirú judge found that the prosecution Drug committed a procedural mistake when requesting authorization from the Criminal Chamber of the Court for wiretapping in this process.