The oral and public trial
against the former Secretary of Domestic Trade, Guillermo Moreno, and the former director of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) of the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INDEC), Beatriz Paglieri , began this Wednesday
for the manipulation of statistics of the inflation of the organization, which occurred between March 2006 and August 2007 during the presidencies of Néstor and Cristina Kirchner.
In the first part of the trial, Moreno tried to reject the accusations against him and said that “my work, as Secretary of Foreign Trade, greatly exceeded him
, the value of the salary had to be preserved and there they only did statistics
.” Moreno is defended by lawyer K Alejandro Rúa.
He is accused of the crimes of abuse of authority, violation of secrets, destruction of records and documents and ideological falsification of public documents.
The Federal Criminal Oral Court No. 2 of the Federal Capital intervenes in this trial
- made up of judges Néstor Costabel, Rodrigo Giménez Uriburu and Jorge Gorini -
The Attorney General Diego Luciani, in charge of the Prosecutor General's Office No. 1 before the TOCF, and the co-adjuvant prosecutor José Ipohorski Lenkiewicz intervene on behalf of the Public Prosecutor's Office.
Prosecutor Diego Luciani, from the Roads case, now accuses Moreno in the INDEC case. Photo Federico Lopez Claro
The day began after 9:30 with the reading of the accusation and the treatment of preliminary issues introduced by the parties. After that, the judges received the investigative statement from Moreno and Paglieri, while the agency's employees, Filia and Cámpora Avellaneda, abstained from testifying. The debate takes place in room B on the ground floor of the Comodoro Py 2002 courts.
In their statements, Moreno and Paglieri referred to their statements and defenses provided timely in the investigation, while
the former Secretary of Commerce also answered the questions posed by the prosecution.
The former Secretary of Internal Trade and the former director of the IPC came to this instance accused as author and co-author, respectively, of the crimes of abuse of authority, violation of secrets, destruction of records and documents and ideological falsification of public documents repeated on seven occasions. For their part, the two employees of the agency are accused as primary participants in the same events. The debate will continue next Wednesday, April 10, from 9:30.
The investigation - carried out by the Federal Prosecutor's Office No. 4, headed by Carlos Stornelli - began in 2007 due to the complaint made by the lawyer of the non-profit civil association “Asamblea por los Derechos Sociales” regarding a series of publications journalistic reports that gave an account of the circumstances and context in which the then director of the IPC, Graciela Bevacqua, was allegedly displaced.
Accordingly, Moreno would have ordered the official to reveal the data corresponding to the businesses on which field studies were carried out to establish inflation indices, in order to “visit” those firms. Since Bevacqua would have refused to do so - protected by the secrecy provided for in Law 17,622 on Statistics and Census - Moreno would have replaced her with Paglieri. The complainant also warned about adulteration and/or manipulation of the inflation index published by INDEC in January 2007.
In this context, prosecutor Stornelli set out to determine if Moreno violated statistical secrecy and if the CPI statistical data were falsified. Subsequently, the investigation was joined by the complaint of the then national senators Gerardo Morales and Ernesto Sanz about the conduct displayed by the former Minister of Economy, Felisa Micelli, Moreno and by Paglieri, whose appointment would have been given in order to falsify inflationary indices. .
The appointment of Marcela Lucía Filia and María Celeste Cámpora Avellaneda was also questioned, who had not proven their technical experience and had not participated in a previous competitive examination and/or background.
Appropriately, prosecutor Stornelli requested the prosecution of Moreno, Paglieri, Filia, Cámpora Avellaneda and the late former director of INDEC, Ana María Edwin. In August 2018, he requested that the investigation be brought to trial.
In this sense, the representative of the Public Prosecutor's Office considered it proven that Moreno abused his authority to appoint people he trusted in the INDEC and, thus, be able to control the CPI and obtain a coefficient of evolution of inflation lower than expected. . According to the accusation, the former Secretary of Commerce would have harassed agency officials to obtain information protected by statistical secrecy and, when he refused, he would have replaced them with people he trusted.
For her part, Paglieri - in her capacity as director of the IPC - would have violated the duties under her charge and abused her functions as director of the IPC and would have provided Moreno - directly or through Filia and Cámpora Avellaneda - classified information. Likewise, they would have falsified the indices for the months of January, February, March, April, May and June 2007.