The visiting minister, Romy Rutherford, responded -through a report- to the amparo appeal presented before the Martial Court by the defense of General (r) Juan Emilio Cheyre, who accused that the trial of the judge “is illegal and arbitrary ” and that “it is based on serious errors of fact and law”.
As reported Thirdafter the Martial Court received the amparo, he asked Minister Rutherford to prepare a report responding to Cheyre’s allegations, who has been in prison in the Peñalolén Military Police Regiment since last October 25.
Throughout 23 pages, Rutherford dismissed what was claimed by Cheyre’s defense and pointed out that “there were executive acts of the crime when the protected person was a military officer, since, as he admitted, it was he himself who ordered the delivery of these Such reasoning allows us to conclude that the jurisdiction of the court to investigate, prosecute and -as in the case- order preventive detention is unquestionable”.
Among Cheyre’s arguments was the argument that the crimes charged occurred when he had ceased to be Commander-in-Chief of the Army, so he was no longer an active soldier. In any case, Rutherford, again, dismissed his thesis.
“The defense seems to have misunderstood that the justified facts -until now- are related to the money from reserved expenses received when the accused was no longer Commander-in-Chief of the Army, but taking advantage precisely of what he himself had arranged by virtue of such position and agreed with his successor prior to his retirement,” stated the visiting minister.
“Because of the foregoing, the imputation refers to the misappropriation of reserved expenses that the accused determined and agreed to materialize when he left his active exercise, and became former commander-in-chief,” he added.
Throughout the report, the judge points out that the former commanders in chief, Fuente-Alba, Oviedo, Izurieta and Cheyre, organized themselves to develop a system to manage the delivery of reserved expenses once they retired.
“It refers to the official who has funds in his charge, that is, that they are in his care, disposition or responsibility and it is precisely that hypothesis that would have been verified in regard to the acting commander in chief, who was in agreement with those former commanders-in-chief who, in turn, received the monthly public funds already explained,” Rutherford said.
Likewise, it indicated that “at least from 2006 and until February 2018, all those who held the position of Commander-in-Chief of the Army arranged to deliver monthly money for expenses reserved to the former Commander-in-Chief of the institution and the latter, to their Once, they agreed to receive them -thus facilitating the concretion of the fact already imputed to the first ones- the concert that has been referred cannot be ignored”.
Along the same lines and reinforcing the previous point, the judge explained that “the defendant has recognized not only that in his position as active commander-in-chief he ordered the delivery of these monies, but also that he received them monthly since he retired from the institution in 2006 and until 2018, without ever giving an account of them, therefore, it recognizes that it did not justify in any way that it had used them in security, as it currently assures”.
“In addition, it should be noted that the defendant also admitted that -given the irregularity in the collection of such resources- he had to pay the Internal Revenue Service (SII) a sum close to $20 million for having established, with respect to these same monies, that it was undeclared income,” he added.
It should be remembered that there are four former commanders in chief of the Army prosecuted for embezzlement of public funds through the theft of funds from reserved expenses. Thus, Rutherford prosecuted Juan Miguel Fuente-Alba, Humberto Oviedo, Oscar Izurieta and against General (r) Juan Emilio Cheyre.
