Glas seeks unification of penalties

The former vice president has two prior sentences of six and eight years for the Bribery and Odebrecht cases.

The former vice president of the Republic, Jorge Glas, seeks to unify their penalties and thus apply to benefit penitentiary of pre-release. He is currently serving two sentences in the jail of Cotopaxi. One for six and another for eight years for illicit association in the Odebrecht case and for bribery in the case Bribes, respectively. Both are firm.

Glas’s defense filed an appeal so that only the infringement is taken into account More serious (that of eight years) and thus apply to the benefit that allows him to serve the rest of his sentence outside the jail.

However, a juez of criminal guarantees of Cotopaxi denied that request. In his reply to Glas’s lawyer, he indicated this week that the former president still has a third sentence, which is not executed. For this reason, he could not process his request.

The process referred to by the judge is the case Singue, which is in the stage of appeal. In fact, the hearing requested by four of the convicted had to be held yesterday afternoon, Thursday, December 2, 2021. However, it was postponed due to the absence of the lawyers of Glas, who was sentenced in the first instance to eight years for peculation. There is still no date for a new call.

In this process, the former Energy Ministers are also on trial, Carlos Pareja Yannuzzelli and Wilson Pástor. On the other hand, three other defendants received sentences of four years in prison as accomplices. Eight other defendants had their innocence.

What the law says

In the event that justice accepts Glas’s appeal and removes his conviction or I sentence him as a last resort, Your defense may insist on the accumulation of penalties in accordance with Art. 81 of the Penal Code, in force until 2014 and with which Glas was sentenced. This normative body was used in their trials because, according to the records, the crimes sand they perpetrated before that year.

The rule of that time indicates that in the event that “there are several crimes repressed with seclusion, the greater penalty will be imposed ”. The Code of Execution of Penalties of the time supports that decision. At Comprehensive Organic Criminal Code (Coip), currently in force, does not contemplate this figure and rather imposes the accumulation of penalties.

The ex-president can also benefit from the benefit of pre-freedom that was included in the regulations today repealed. In Art. 8 of the Internal Instructions for the application of prison benefits issued by the Social Rehabilitation Service (Snai) three requirements are observed to access the benefit.

1 Certificate of being in minimum security issued by the director of the jail;

2 having served two-fifths of the sentence imposed, which in Glas’s case would be three years and eight months in prison,

3 have a report issued by the information and diagnostic technician team.

Quito, December 2, 2021. Hearing for the Singe Case in the National Court of Justice. APIFOTO / Juan Ruiz Condor

The penalty reduction has already been applied

In February 2020, the former manager of the state Petroecuador, Marco Calvopiña, sentenced for corruption, has already made use of this resource. That same year, the former Minister of Correísmo, Alecksey Mosquera, Sentenced for participating in the Odebrecht plot, he also took advantage of that figure.

The criminal lawyer and professor Nicolas Salas he maintains that if Glas meets all the requirements, he could regain his freedom. “In the specific case, if he has the possibility and the norm protects him, he can regain his freedom. We are used to politicizing some cases and seriously violate the principle of legal certainty ”.

Glas has been in prison since October 2017 when the investigations against him in the case began Odebrecht. Yesterday, members of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) who arrived to make recommendations regarding the prison crisis met with the former vice president in a “reserved manner,” said the director of the Cotopaxi, Victor Andrade.