The Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice supports the extradition request made to Spain to hand over Rafael Ernesto Reiter Muñoz, former PDVSA security chief when Rafael Ramírez was in charge of the state company.
The decision to endorse this extradition request is contained in sentence 216 of the Criminal Chamber drafted by magistrate Carmen Castro.
Last April, the US media revealed documents where it was said that Reiter Muñoz would be questioned in a file opened in the South Court of Texas, United States, in which Rafael Ramírez is mentioned as the recipient of bribes collected from oil contractors. The United States is also interested in having Reiter extradited to that country, according to reports.
Reiter Muñoz has been imprisoned in Spain since October 2017 for his alleged involvement in money laundering from the aforementioned bribes through Andorran banks, among others.
Precisely for this fact, last April the Public Ministry requested an arrest warrant against Reiter Muñoz, which was approved by the 27th Control Court of Caracas, an instance that also agreed to start the extradition process, according to the file sent to the Criminal Chamber. last June 13.
The investigation into money laundering in Europe, where Reiter Muñoz is allegedly implicated, began on December 1, 2017, on the occasion of the report of 11/30/17 issued by the National Anti-Corruption Police.
That report in turn draws on police documents from Andorra, the Financial Intelligence Unit of that principality and the United States Department of the Treasury.
The general document describes the so-called Salazar Group (due to the leader Diego Salazar), made up of a group of companies linked to each other “to defraud Venezuelan state companies.” These reports identify officials from PDVSA and the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum “who received large bribes during the period between 2007 and 2012.”
The amount laundered in the Private Bank of Andorra, for example, for the period between October 2011 to November 2012, reaches the amount of 1,347,339,972 euros, reflects the judgment of the TSJ.
Due to belonging to the so-called Salazar Group, Reiter Martínez is requested by the Venezuelan justice to be prosecuted for the crimes of fraudulent embezzlement, influence peddling, money laundering and association.
The magistrates reviewed the documentation presented by the Prosecutor’s Office and verified that they comply with the provisions of the laws, for which reason they declared Reiter’s extradition admissible.
