“Simple Martinelli employee” linked to $22 million laundering case
DESCRIBED by her lawyer as a “simple employee” of Ricamar, the Ricardo Martinelli business empire, lawyer Evelyn Vargas Reynaga managed companies that according to Swiss prosecutors were used to launder millions of dollars for the sons of the former president.
Vargas spent Wednesday night behind bars awaiting her second day of interrogation by the Special AntiCorruption Prosecutor after being arrested in Mexico earlier in the day.
She was questioned for eight hours before being was taken to the headquarters of the Department of Judicial Investigation(DIJ).
She was brought to Panama from Mexico, where she had been detained on a red alert issued by Interpol.
René Rodríguez, one of her lawyers, said she is collaborating with the Public Ministry and had had answered more than 100 questions.
“She was a simple employee of Importadora Ricamar, and that is all her involvement in this issue,” he said, reports La Prensa.
As part of the investigation, Swiss prosecutors have frozen accounts containing
$22 million that have been linked to Ricardo Alberto and Luis Enrique Martinelli Linares, the sons of the former president. The money allegedly came from the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht, which has admitted to paying $59 million in bribes during the Martinelli administration.
Vargas Reynaga,was the lawyer who managed companies that according to Swiss prosecutors served to launder millions of dollars for the Martinelli offspring.
