10  years jail time for missing spy equipment  

The First Liquidating Court of Criminal Cases, declared the former director of the extinct National Aid Program (PAN) Giacomo Tamburrelli, and Gustavo Pérez, former director of the National Police, criminally responsible for the alleged irregular purchase and loss of espionage equipment , to the penalty of 120 months in prison, for the crime against the public administration, in the form of embezzlement, to the detriment of the former Social Investment Fund (FIS).

In the ruling of March 10, Judge Agueda Rentería pointed out that both former officials, due to their lack of care and breach of their duties as directors at the time (period 2009-2014), allowed economic damage to the State to occur due to the sum of  $10,871,000, by virtue of the purchase of highly sensitive security equipment, in accordance with the audit carried out by the Comptroller General of says a statement from the Judicial Branch.

The document reveals that, depending on the circumstances of time and place, the former directors at the time were in charge and responsible for the administration of the technological equipment acquired by contract.

“ The fraudulent intent of the defendants is evident since they carried out actions tending to the acquisition of a piece of equipment whose need is questionable, using State resources assigned to an entity that must allocate said resources to merely social activities in favor of the neediest ” is detailed in the sentence.

In this sense, Judge Rentería states that in view of the facts declared proven that proved the criminal responsibility of both defendants, the court of the case also applied to Tamburrelli and Pérez the accessory penalty of disqualification from the exercise of public functions for the same term, which it will run once they complete the main sentence of imprisonment.

The case was investigated by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor of the Public Ministry, which began the investigations after the complaint filed on December 2, 2014, which described alleged irregularities that arose within the extinct FIS, today the Social Assistance Directorate.