Bailed ex-ministers Miami trips nixed

FORMER MINISTER of Labor and Workforce Development, Alma Cortés,  who was released from jail after paying a record $300,000 bail    has had a request  to travel “at least” one week a month to Miami, Florida quashed.

In an October 14 resolution, the judges Wilfredo Saenz and Manuel Mata Avendaño (special alternate) concluded that they  had no functional competence to rule on the issue because, first,  she must appear before the Fourth Criminal Court where she is facing trial for alleged unjust enrichment.

In  September,  Cortés asked the Fourth Criminal Court permission to travel to Barcelona, Spain, from September 28 to October 6.

The Court authorized the trip, but the Sixth Anticorruption, prosecutor Aurelio Vasquez, filed notice of appeal. The Court ordered cancellation  of the authorization , because when it had decide on the matter the date of the trip to Barcelona had  passed.

Cortés is barred from leaving the country without judicial authorization, by order of Vasquez.

She is one of ex-president Ricardo Martinelli’s lawyers and was named by him as interim president of the CD party, a move rejected by many CD deputies.