Former Cocle governor facing embezzlement trial

 After presenting a medical excuse last May, businessman, and politician Richard Fifer has been facing an oral trial since Tuesday for allegedly withholding worker-employer contributions amounting to more than $6 million, to the detriment of the Social Security Fund (CSS).

The former governor of Coclé during the government of Mireya Moscoso is being tried by Virginia Rodríguez, Florelia Bonilla and Amarelis Sucre.

The Public Ministry, which investigated the legal representative of the company Petaquilla Gold, SA, for allegedly withholding CSS quotas between 2013 and 2015, participates through the superior anti-corruption prosecutor Mahmad Daud Hasan, and Deputy Prosecutor Olmedo Gómez.

During the start of the hearing on Tuesday, the initial arguments of the Public Ministry and the private technical defense were evacuated. The presentation of 25 testimonials, expert and documentary evidence also began.

The hearing will resume this Friday, September 2, at the headquarters of the Accusatory Penal System of the province of Coclé. The trial judges stated that the recess is due to the fact that the court had another previously scheduled hearing.

Other cases
In 2021, Fifer was sentenced by the Criminal Court of the First Judicial Circuit of Panama to 120 months in prison for the crime of aggravated fraud against the company Gold Dragon Capital Management, LTD.

In 2005, this company signed a contract with Petaquilla Minerals, SA, for a “purchase option on the rights arising from various concessions”, committing to sell two polygons of the “called Belencillo Concession” and to exchange shares. According to Gold Dragon Capital Management, LTD, the deal fell through.

In another investigation, that of the “New Business” case, the name of Petaquilla Minerals also appears as part of a financial operation where money from the sale of its shares was used as “support to request the transfer for the sum of two million dollars” to the New Business Services Limited account, used for the purchase of Editora Panamá América.