Peruvian supreme judge Juan Carlos Checkley imposed
36 months of preventive detention for former president Pedro Castillo
, who is already in prison for his failed self-coup, while being investigated for a corruption case.
During a virtual hearing, Checkley said that the measure was "ideal" because it is not a common trial,
but one that is highly dangerous"
and explained that the former president, detained for 18 months in preventive detention for the self-coup, has incurred in obstruction of Justice through the intimidation of witnesses, which has even reached the Attorney General herself, Patricia Benavides.
This new preventive detention measure will be computed in parallel to the one imposed in December 2022 for the alleged crimes of rebellion and, alternatively, conspiracy, for the failed coup attempt.
Judge Checkley assured that
there are serious and well-founded elements of conviction against the former president
, for which the first prerequisite for issuing a preventive detention order was met.
The second condition is that the possibility of the penalty exceeds 4 years.
For this case, the Supreme Deputy Prosecutor Galinka Meza, representative of the Special Team against Power Corruption, estimates that Castillo Terrones could receive a sentence of 32 years.
"The penalty to be estimated, given that in a royal contest Mr. Castillo Terrones is being attributed the commission of the crimes, we have that the sum, in accordance with article 50, allows us to establish that the penalty to be imposed, in the case (of) that Be it so —in one assumption—, he would be sentenced to a 32-year prison sentence,” Meza said in a previous hearing.
The cause
The preventive detention against the ex-president responds to
the pressure he exerted for the appointment of an official without the technical profile
as general manager of the state-owned Petroperú, as well as the cancellation of an international tender for the purchase of biodiesel and its award to a specific company .
Likewise, the appointment of the former Minister of Transport and Communications Juan Silva, a fugitive from justice, with the alleged intention of taking over that ministry with related officials who facilitate "
directing the projects"
of infrastructure, in charge of that portfolio.
In the same way, the judge cited the two million soles (half a million dollars) that the businesswoman Karelim López said she had delivered to Castillo, through her advisers in the Government Palace, to be favored with an award of public works.
Checkley asserted that
"Castillo had a key role"
in these "illegal conducts."
Regarding Castillo's danger of flight and entrenchment, the supreme judge specified that the arrest of the former president, last December, occurred "when he tried to seek asylum in the Mexican embassy," which was corroborated by the public statements of the ambassador in Lima and of the Mexican president himself, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Castillo's wife and two minor children were received by López Obrador and granted asylum by that country, hours after the failed coup.
Regarding the attachment, the magistrate recalled that Castillo does not have a current real address and that the Barbadillo prison, where he has been held since December, cannot be considered
his current address
, as requested by his lawyer.
Castillo denies it
In the previous diligence, last Tuesday,
Castillo "absolutely and categorically" denied
that he is the author and is part of a criminal organization formed during his Government (2021-2022), as the Prosecutor's Office accused him when arguing his request for 36 months of remand against him.
"I flatly and categorically deny that I am the author and that I am part of a criminal network, the only crime I have committed is serving my country as President of the Republic," Castillo said in a virtual hearing called by Judge Checkley.
"I have not committed any crime
, Mr. Judge, Peru knows, the people know, that today those who have made the constitutional accusation would also in any case be part of this alleged criminal organization, because they mostly passed through the offices of the office presidential," he said.
He rejected that the prosecutor's request is based on a possible flight risk when, according to what he said, he is "in a high-security prison" and that he has no family roots, since his wife and children are asylum seekers in Mexico.
"Here there is no danger of flight
, my home roots today is this place (the prison)," he reiterated before telling the judge that "he has to show that he is on the side of the people, not on the side of the enemies."
The Public Ministry has also requested 36 months of pretrial detention for the former Ministers of Transport and Housing Juan Silva Villegas and Geiner Alvarado López, respectively.
Silva, who has been a fugitive from Justice since last year, is accused of the crime of criminal organization and simple collusion, while Alvarado is indicated as the alleged perpetrator of the crime of criminal organization.
Source: EFE and AFP
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