Probe of rip-off lawmakers continues

The Anti-Corruption  Prosecutor’s Office will present a request to a guarantee judge to declare a complex cause for the investigations carried out against a group of former lawmakers for the alleged irregular handling of the payrolls under their charge.

The complaints filed in 2018 by former comptroller Federico Humbert related to those deputies who were not reelected in the May 2019 elections.

At that time, Humbert filed complaints against 11 deputies, whom he accused, among other things, of keeping personnel named on the Assembly’s payroll and who at the same time provided their services in private companies. Humbert also alleged that some people who appeared on the forms did not go to their jobs.

Sources told La Prensa that the petition is based on the large number of documents, statements, and procedures that need to be analyzed and carried out to determine whether the positions that appeared in the complaints filed by Humbert correspond to people who actually fulfilled their functions.

The sources explained that to date the prosecutor’s office analyzes the audit reports made by the Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic, which led Humbert to file some 11 complaints against deputies and officials of the Assembly in 2018 for irregularities in the appointment of people that appeared on the Assembly sheet.

During the presidency of the National Assembly of deputy Yanibel Ábrego (2017/2019), a group of auditors from the Comptroller General was prevented from entering the Legislature to carry out audits of the deputies’ payroll.

Investigations have been delayed due to the pandemic, as proceedings have been suspended, which has made it difficult to advance in the investigations.

In a plenary session of the Court held on July 25, 2019, the magistrates decided that all the processes against deputies who were not reelected in the electoral elections would be referred to the Public Ministry.

In August of that same year, the complaints filed against the deputies Athenas Athanasiadis, Aris De Icaza, Jorge Alberto Rosas and Rubén De León were sent to the Anticorruption Prosecutors.

In the case of Athanasiadis, the comptroller Humbert filed on August 22, 2018 a complaint for alleged irregular handling of professional service contracts (form 172). According to the complaint, it allegedly had about 15 employees of the family business – Avícola Athenas – as beneficiaries of the contracts.

In the case of former deputy Aris de Icaza, he was presented with three complaints, one in which he allegedly had cashed checks for cash as a result of a payroll and, later, the money would have been deposited in a personal account. The second for checks issued to a person who did not work in the Assembly and another for the appointment of 10 people on the Assembly payroll, but who at the same time work in a private company.

Complaints were also filed, among others, against former deputies and the current deputy Francisco Alemán.

Recently, the Supreme Court of Justice admitted a complaint against the deputy of the Democratic Revolutionary Party, Leandro Ávila, related to the handling of form 172.