Call for audit of judge’s impunity rulings

The Panama arm of Transparency International – The Citizen Alliance for Justice-  is spearheading a call  for an audit of Representatives of civil society organizations asked to perform an audit of cases  in the hands of controversial judge Leslie  Loaiza who has a record of dismissing  or annulling  corruption cases involving high profile figures in, or linked to the Ricardo Martinelli  administration

On Saturday, December 22, the day after the filing of three cases involving alleged embezzlement by dozens of suspects and people close to Martinelli, anti-corruption prosecutors of the Public Ministry (MP) announced that they will appeal the judgments of the fifteenth criminal judge.

Meanwhile, the Alliance   Director Magaly Castillo, said:  “Loaiza is the reflection of a system of administration of justice that is adrift, in which the magistrates of the Court themselves violate the Constitution and the law, since they have appointed judges who were not selected through the office. a system of merits. “”

“What we are experiencing is a national tragedy and what is happening is the impunity in which all high-profile cases are falling,” she complained.

Carlos Lee, of that same organization, supported the proposal of citizen audit. In his opinion, it is necessary to detect with accuracy the procedural deficiencies that motivated the closing of the processes.

Fredy Pitti, from Juntos Decidimos, said that the handling given to these high-profile cases, both by the Public Prosecutor’s Office and by the Judiciary, has been “quite poor”, so it would not hurt to conduct a review of them, due to the millions of dollars of the State lost.

In the three cases annulled by Judge Loaiza this week, the Public Prosecutor’s Office investigated the alleged injury of more than $23 million  -according to the audits of the Comptroller General.