The former Ombudsman, Patria Portugal, had her sentence of eight years in prison applied by the defunct Eighth Criminal Circuit Court for the crime of embezzlement confirmed, as announced by the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ ), who rejected an appeal filed by his lawyer.
As part of the sentence, an accessory sentence of 48 months of disqualification from exercising public functions is maintained.
Portugal has been under investigation for some years regarding two contracts it signed while serving as Ombudsman in April 2011.
One of these contracts was with the company Imaginarium Studio, SA, for an amount of $249,845, for the redesign of the entity’s website, and the other for $199,983, for training, awarded to the company En Avant, SA
After knowing these contracts, the then head of the National Authority for Transparency and Access to Information (ANTAI), Abigail Benzadón, and the lawyer José Antonio Moncada filed a complaint with the Public Ministry.
