Lawyer son of former Supreme Court judge gets five years for selling judgments

A sentence of five years in prison for the crime of influence-peddling was imposed by a trial court on Oydén Ortega Collado  the lawyer son, of former Supreme Court Justice Oydén Ortega Durán.

Claudia Purcait, the assistant to the former magistrate drew a four-year sentence.

Judges Ilka Castillo, Jennifer Saavedra, and Roberto Tejeira, during the reading of the sentence on Friday afternoon, specified that Ortega Collado received money with the promise of obtaining a positive resolution of a court case and that he also had the collaboration of Purcait, as a primary accomplice to achieve these ends.

In Purcait’s case, the judges decided to commute her sentence to a $5,000 fine.

The judges determined that the actions of both revealed the existence of a desire to circumvent the administration of justice, diverting impartiality to favor one of the parties.

The ruling recognized that from 2013 to 2014, Ortega Collado held talks with César Alvarado Taylor, to get the Civil Chamber of the Court to admit an appeal for annulment in a lawsuit involving eight farms of the Cerro Jesús Livestock Society, in the Chiriquí province, and that Alvarado Taylor made payments to Ortega Collado for this purpose.

During the reading of the sentence, the judges estimated that the anti-corruption prosecutors Leyda Sáenz and Elvis Coronado determined that Ortega Collado used his status as the son of a Court magistrate to try to obtain a favorable cassation for César Alvarado Taylor, in the aforementioned land dispute.

They also considered that Ortega Collado used his friendship with Purcait, who served as his father’s assistant, to obtain a favorable verdict for Alvarado.

During the trial, the prosecution managed to establish that Alvarado made payments of $5,000 and $15,000 to Ortega Collado to obtain the admission of the appeal and that a favorable procedure is given to the merits of the judicial process.

The judges stated in the ruling that the defense of Ortega Collado and Purcait could not discredit the evidence provided by the prosecution, among which were a series of conversations, via WhatsApp, held between Alvarado and Ortega Collado, that gave details of the payments and the steps taken to achieve a favorable ruling.

The judges also explained that it was evidenced that the judicial process by which Alvarado gave money to Ortega Collado existed and that Purcait was the one who handled the issue of the admission of the cassation since she was the right hand of Judge Ortega Durán.

The judges ruled that the actions of Ortega Collado and Purcait hit the institutionality of the administration of justice since they tried to manage a judicial process through the payment of money, promoting corruption, and affecting the image of the administration of justice.

Orison Cogley, attorney for the former magistrate’s son, announced that he will file an appeal.