The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Pressures and threats to witnesses who testify in the Vialidad case, the first oral trial against Cristina

2020-09-06T12:51:13.127Z


Defense lawyers interrupt the declarants. The lawyer Silvina Martínez was made a false report of espionage. The attorney of the vice acts in block with others. The court had to draw his attention.


Nicolas Wiñazki

09/05/2020 - 20:52

  • Clarín.com

  • Politics

In the Argentine Republic of the pandemic, the confinement and the multiple crises

a historical oral and public trial takes place

.

The Oral Criminal Court Number 2 of the Federal Capital (TOF 2) is judging the acting vice president of the Nation, among twelve other defendants, in a case of possible corruption with the public works business.

It never happened in a democracy.

Cristina Fernández is accused of leading an illicit association that used all the power of the State to benefit with contracts and irregular payments for an approximate amount of 46 billion pesos to her business partner, the sudden builder Lázaro Báez.

As

Clarín was

able to verify

, this trial

progresses with irregular situations

.

Disturbing

Many of the witnesses who testified and who complicated Fernández's procedural situation suffered, in the

trial

itself,

repeated and threatening pressures and objections

made by several of the defense attorneys for the vice president, from Báez, and from other defendants, such as the former coordinator of the national public works, Carlos Kirchner, first cousin of former president Néstor Kirchner.

Even one of the main witnesses and plaintiffs in the case, the lawyer Silvina Martínez, who worked on this file during her investigation stage together with the former deputy Margarita Stolbizer,

formally

presented a brief

before the TOF 2 in which she denounced that After appearing as a witness in the trial known as "Obra Pública" he

suffered "intimidation and intimidation"

from

"Cristina Kirchner and her lawyer Carlos Beraldi

.

"

It happens that it was denounced by the vice-presidential lawyer in another case, which investigates possible illegal espionage during the government of Mauricio Macri.

Martínez

denied the accusation that sought to involve her in a spy story with ironic prose

, but noting the severity of what happened.

And he described in a paragraph what other witnesses experienced before and after during the hearings of the Public Works trial: "Everyone in the Court was witnesses to the pressure and lack of respect suffered the day I gave testimonial statement. To the point that the The prosecutor himself had to draw attention to the latter. But I think the latest events

exceed the usual framework of any process

. "

At the last hearing of the oral trial against the vice president, another witness named Carlos Costilla, a former shareholder of a construction company called Kank y Costilla, bought by the growing Báez emporium,

was also constantly interrupted and pressured by defense attorneys for K defendants

.

Costilla's statement was constantly interrupted.

As with Martínez and other witnesses, the prosecutor for the oral trial, Diego Luciani, drew attention to what happened.

After the hearing, several of the defense lawyers tried to justify their actions.

The TOF 2 judges themselves then had to communicate, in an unprecedented event, "to all the parties" that the claims made by those defenders were not consistent with the arguments put forward in their explanations.

The magistrates also added another summary of what is happening in the oral trial against the vice president.

They said that the insistent proposals of lawyers K formed a scenario that "shows that the numerous objections to questions had become the veiled exercise of

a strategy that prevented, on the one hand, questioning the Public Prosecutor's Office, and on the other, freely denouncing to the witness

".

The judges' warning shows the climate that exists in each hearing: "For that reason, the Court having already resolved the substantiated claim, later by the Presidency it was decided not to allow the defenses to delve into such issue, in order not to incur in what was sought to avoid,

this is any conditioning to the witness

, always leaving open the possibility of making use of the floor after the statement of the same and having to remember that the granting of the use of the same is a spring of the one who holds the direction of the debate , whatever the modality of the hearing in progress, that is, a remote or face-to-face hearing ".

The TOF judges are Andrés Basso, Jorge Gorini, and Rodrigo Jiménez Uriburu.

The substitute judge is Adriana Pallioti and, as already mentioned, the prosecutor is Diego Luciani.

Among the accusers are the Anti-Corruption Office (OA) and the Financial Information Unit (UIF).

Vice President Cristina Fernández, and the group of lawyers for the rest of the defendants, tried to

delay

the start of this trial by presenting around one hundred annulments and proposals, an exorbitant number for a case already raised to oral trial.

All of these legal tricks were effective, in one sense: absolutely all of them were rejected in various instances.

The vice president herself criticized the judges and the prosecutor several times in public, as well as those who investigated the case during its investigation stage, the prosecutors Gerardo Pollicita and Ignacio Mahiques, and the judge Julián Ercolini.

Fernández even tried to delay the beginning of the process by asking the Supreme Court, through his lawyer, Beraldi, to take the entire file just to analyze one of his objections.

The highest court made copies of the thousands of pages and the trial could finally begin.

Once the pandemic arrived, the K defenses again tried to stop the development of the process and at the insistence of the prosecutor Luciani, the hearings were resumed through a remote system.

Cristina Fernández declared

very angry on the dock.

Scream.

She was vice president-elect but had not yet assumed office

.

His presentation was perhaps the first indication of what today seems to be

a specific strategy that brought together

, perhaps for reasons that have nothing to do with the law or chance, a large part of the defendants' lawyers.

More than individual defenses of each of them, their defenders show signs

of acting as a block

.

Until now, the witnesses who were summoned by the accusing parties have validated the thesis of possible mismanagement in the granting of public works in favor of the Báez companies, which failed to comply with the terms, costs and objectives of the contracts to build infrastructure with state funds in the province of Santa Cruz.

The one who contributed a relevant report on the subject was the former head of the National Highway, Javier Iguacel.

The same day that he resigned from his position as federal judge,

Rodolfo Canicoba Corral tried him

in another case for alleged mismanagement in the toll concessions during the Macri administration.

Another judicial chance?

The witness Costilla, who tried to be constantly interrupted by the K defenses, stated that the construction company that belonged to his father was sold to the Báez group.

And he related that his father, before he died, revealed that he wanted to get rid of that company because he had tired of

"passing envelopes" to officials

he did not identify.

His sister, Miriam, had testified in the case and said that once the family business passed into the hands of Báez, the State collections that previously took around 270 days to be deposited in the companies' accounts, took a fantastic speed and that average dropped to 30 days or 60 days.

The partner of the then President was already in command of the construction company.

The witnesses who tried to be interrupted by lawyers K were various.

Some of them, according to the sources consulted,

were warned that their statements could fall into contradictions and were alerted to the possibility of trials for false testimonies

, among other pressures.

Finally, the prosecutor Luciani and the judges decided to stop, this last Tuesday, when the witness Costilla testified, what the magistrates described as "a strategy."

Towards the end of the testimony of Dr. Martínez, and after cross accusations were experienced against the declarant on behalf of the defenses K, the prosecutor Luciani took the floor and asked for "forgiveness" for what he called was an "outburst" of his part, adding that "

I cannot allow anyone in this room to be disrespected."

In her complaint to the TOF 2, formalized last June, Dr. Martínez explained that she was obliged to inform the judges what she was suffering, not only because of her personal experience: "The purpose of this presentation is to leave evidence of what happened and thus be able to prevent other witnesses from suffering consequences for their testimony. Needless to say, the conditions are not in place for the National State to provide me with protection. I only hope that those who dare to report acts of corruption or comply with their legal obligation to give testimony

does not end up being persecuted, harassed and threatened

by the defendants in this case, placing themselves at risk of their life and that of their family or putting their job source in danger ".

While other subjects monopolize the agenda of the conjuncture, a historical oral and public trial unfolds with extraordinary events.

"History acquitted me

,

"

the vice president was upset when she testified at the trial.

I do not pass.

Source: clarin

All news articles on 2020-09-06

You may like

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-28T06:04:53.137Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.