The Ninth Judge of the Criminal District of Managua, Luden Martín Quiroz García, suspended the lawyer Orieta Benavides Quintero, defense of the political prisoner and former presidential candidate, Cristiana Chamorro Barrios, for six months, according to a circular issued by the secretariat of the Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ), which had access to Article 66.
The resolution, dated May 17, 2022, details that the complaint filed by the Ortega judge is because the lawyer Benavides Quintero incurred in “very serious disciplinary infractions by failing to comply with her obligations, failing to comply with ethical principles, disrespect for authority court, procedural parties and witnesses.
“According to the provisions of articles 2, 3 and 5 of Decree Number 1618, Sanctions for Lawyers and Notaries Public for Crimes in the Exercise of their Profession, in accordance with article 126 of the Regulations of the Judicial Career Law, The lawyer Orieta María Benavides Quintero is sanctioned, with suspension in the exercise of her profession as a lawyer, for a period of six months, counted from the notification of this resolution, “says the document signed and sealed by Rubén Montenegro Espinoza , secretary of the CSJ.
Related news: Cenidh asks the UN to “redouble efforts” to achieve the release of political prisoners
The document concludes that, once the sanction imposed on Chamorro’s defender has been completed, “it will be automatically enabled, which will be published through the website of this Supreme Court.”
Benavidez’s work
Since Chamorro’s imprisonment, sentenced to eight years in prisonthe lawyer Benavides has been denouncing the arbitrariness in the judicial process mounted against the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation (FVBCH) for the alleged crime of money, goods and assets laundering, in which the former deputy Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Barrios was also convicted, the former accountant Marcos Fletes, the former financier Walter Gómez and the driver Pedro Vásquez.
In April of this year, Benavides participated in the forum «Trials, arbitrariness and annulments as a weapon of repression» organized by ´Southern Voices, where he denounced that the entire process against the FVBCH was “a manual of violations of due process. We are talking about the tragedy of all the defendants in the case against the Foundation », he said at the time.
Related news: Sergio Ramírez: The current reality in Nicaragua is “lacerating”
“The entire procedure from start to finish was plagued with nullities and arbitrariness. All the procedural and constitutional rights and guarantees of each of the people subjected to this illegal and improper process were violated, “said Chamorro’s lawyer in that forum.
Chamorro was the opposition figure most likely to win the presidential elections on November 7, in which Ortega was re-elected for his fifth term, fourth in a row and second along with his wife, Rosario Murillo, as vice president, with his main contenders in prison. .
The former presidential candidate and daughter of the former president of Nicaragua, Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, will serve 380 days under house arrest this June 17, after being arrested on June 2, 2021, after the search of her home.
