Persecution and health challenges
WHILE FORMER Labor Minister and interim CD leader Alma Cortés, mouthed “political persecution” the party mantra for anyone charged with corruption for acts committed during the Martinelli administration, her defense hauled another familiar tactic out of the legal bag of tricks.
Criminal lawyer Carlos Carrillo asked for a medical evaluation for the woman accused of illegal enrichment totaling $2.5 million.
During 12 hours of questioning by anti-corruption prosecutor Aurelio Vasquez, she said she had no health problems. They surfaced when the anti-corruption prosecutor announced that she would be remanded to a police cell on Thursday August 11 with questioning to continue the next day.
But, instead of an appointment at the prosecutor’s office she was whisked away the Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences for a two-hour medical checkup which produced good news and bad news. In reportedly good health, she arrived in handcuffs, “with a downcast face” according to media reports, and was sent back to her cell, until August 17.
Meanwhile a Criminal Circuit Court rejected a bail request.
The decision of the judicial authority was based on an audit revealing that the ex-Minister could not justify $ 2.5 million in assets acquired in the period 2009-2014.
While Cortés, a legal advisor to ex-president Ricardo Martinelli, has time to ponder her past and future, La Prensa reports that two other people who, according to the Comptroller’s audit, could have helped Cortes acquire the $2.5 million will be facing the Anticorruption Prosecutor. Both are accused of unjustified enrichment. Hopefully they are in good health and will not attract the CD noise circus that attempted to disrupt the first Cortes arraignment.
