JUSTICE CRISIS: Urgent need to ratify substitute judges

THE CRISIS  in Panama’s judicial system is being deepened by the failure of the National Assembly to ratify or reject the appointment of three substitute judges named by the executive last year.

The trio in limbo are  Luis Camargo, Katia  Carmen Di Bello, and Judith Esther Cossú de Herrera

The issue is important because the number of magistrates unable to participate in decisions like the wiretapping case of Ricardo Martinelli, could increase and, the vacancies in the plenary session of the Court need to be filled.

Last  week, the attorneys for five wiretap  victims and one accuser asked the judges Hernán De León, Efrén Tello (substitute for Luis Fábrega),and Asunción Alonso (substitute for  José Ayú Prado) to recuse  after Attorney General  Kenia Porcell revealed that De León confessed that he had been wiretapped and that Tello and Alonso would agree to vote in favor of “knocking down” the Martinelli process.

Ayú Prado declared himself impeded in the Martinelli case in 2015 while, Jerónimo Mejía as judge of guarantees and Harry Díaz as a prosecutor, in the case cannot be part of the plenary session when it meets to deal with matters linked to the process.

Another concern is that the lack of substitutes is causing a judicial default. In  January, the National Assembly rejected the appointments of Zuleyka Moore and Ana Lucrecia Tovar to replace judges  Jerónimo Mejía and Oydén Ortega, Following that decision, the vote on the appointments of the substitutes has not been addressed again.