OPINION: Sweetheart plea deal ignitesalarms

The effective collaboration agreement of Rafael Guardia Jaén raised the rejection of the citizenship because It involved the return of goods suspected of having been purchased with public funds. Now the beneficiary of the agreement has agreed to deliver this patrimony to the State, to silence the controversy and take advantage of this favorable opportunity. However, prosecutors agreed to eliminate 15 criminal proceedings they had against Guardia Jaén, in exchange for his participation as a witness against the others involved in these crimes, and the Public Prosecutor’s Office even undertakes not to investigate any other possible offense derived from its management in the National Aid Program. This overwhelming generosity ignites all the alarms about the subject. While in Brazil or the United States the penalties are reduced according to the effective collaboration, in Panama, the reduction of a sentence precedes cooperation. Could it be that the Public Ministry has all the causes investigated and delimited to make this offer? The example of the Guardia Jaén agreement demonstrates what we still have to learn to do justice in complex cases …LA PRENSA, Dec 19