“He brought patrol cars faster than Heber” and was "a nice vermin": this is how they see Astesiano in their neighborhood

It is a mini city located on the border of the Conciliación and Sayago Norte neighborhoods, which has a shopping center, supermarket and even a school of its own, which even Astesiano attended. It is enough to take a few steps and consult any neighbor to see how well known that police officer is who ended up being the former head of presidential security. For young people, perhaps he was unknown (until the press reported his arrest), but it will not be difficult for the adult population to remember him.

Housing complex in Millán and Lecocq

One of the neighbors approaches and speaks of Astesiano with complete fluency as if he had known him all his life. He says that he is not surprised by everything he has read and heard from the former head of Presidential Security –today accused of criminal association, among other crimes–. It was from the days when people still discussed the police notes of Astesiano, which are more than 30 and date from 1996 to 2022. The man took with a certain grace that his file is now known, since for the neighborhood, these annotations had already been known for a long time.

The comings and goings of Astesiano were recorded in the memory of the oldest in the complex, today noted for its level of security.

Before his arrest, Astesiano frequently went to the housing complex, because the supermarket that operates there contracted the security services of his company. The guards who answered to Astesiano kept an eye on the commerce and also made a tour between the housing blocks. Those who knew Astesian’s movements there know that he was a man closely linked to the policeand with contacts everywhere.

“The sectional policemen did not want to mess with him, a civilian had more weight than a policeman,” added a neighbor who even saw him escape from the uniformed officers years ago inside the complex, when there were not even cell phones with a camera.

photo: Leonardo Carreno

Housing complex in Millán and Lecocq

“I brought you patrol cars faster than Heber”, affirmed again and again another neighbor who even got to talk to him for some people who were hanging around the place. He said that Astesiano was a very cordial person, that he was always at the order of the neighborhood. “I told him: the thugs are brave. After a while, patrol cars fell,” he said with ease..

Among the neighbors there are those who regret that Astesiano failed them or scammed them in the most ingenious ways, others do not make a value judgment although they admit that he had a high profile in the neighborhood, and another, the majority, prefers not to talk about him.

Astesiano, who is 51 years old, is married and has a large family. His parents and his wife lived until recently in the Millán y Lecocq complex; where one of his sons who was part of the Armed Forces still resides but resigned this year, he knew The Observer. astesian lived in his childhood in the neighborhood although as an adult he has not had a fixed address. So much so that in the police system it appears as an address: “I did not enter 1583 corner I did not enter” (sic).

The neighbors point out that he had several commercial premises, and also took over several apartments in the complex. As reported The Observerthe Prosecutor’s Office opened a line of investigation for money laundering and is tracking the assets that Astesiano had in the name of figureheads, including several apartments, a nightclub and a security company.

Prosecutor Gabriela Fosatti managed to imprison Astesiano and three people who were part of the gang – the notary public Álvaro Fernández and two Russian citizens – for the crimes of alleged marital status, criminal association and influence peddling. The prosecutor proved that the four were part of the organization that was dedicated to falsifying documentation to allow Russian citizens to obtain the Uruguayan identity card and passport, that they had been operating since at least the end of August 2021 and that they even had meetings with two other members in his office on the 4th floor of the Executive Tower.

Astesiano had his guards deployed at various points in Montevideo, and selected some of them to guard the President of the Republic. The Presidency then asked the Ministry of the Interior for the file of all the presidential security officials, to prevent the Astesiano scandal from repeating itself within the “heart of the government”, as defined by the nationalist senator Jorge Gandini.

In fact, Presidency transferred ten officials who were part of the Presidential Security Service (SSP) to other departments of the State, after learning that several of them had criminal records.

Astesian was dismissed from Presidency after the judicial decision, for which he will be in preventive detention until October 27. He asked not to be imprisoned along with the rapiñers of his son who he himself persecuted last July 13. Several brothers, members of “Los Cabecitas” went to prison, and he said he was afraid of reprisals. The day of the hearing before Judge Matías Porciúncula requested special security measures, and considerations for his health (have diabetes and they discovered a stone in his gallbladder recently, after medical treatment).

The “nice vermin” that “is not John Paul II”

“A little vermin but nice” or “he is not John Paul II” are phrases with which his relatives describe him. “He has a certain sympathy, he was a very handsome boy when he was young,” summed up a person consulted who has a family relationship with him.

“There are people who don’t want it because he has made his macanas. But he has helped people in the neighborhood, ”added another person close to him, and who saw him born.

From a young age, Astesiano remained close to the National Party, and over the years he became Lacalle Pou’s extremely trusted man; The two met in the 1999 presidential elections when Astesiano was Senator Sergio Abreu’s driver. In 2004 he joined Luis Alberto Lacalle Herrera’s work team, and from there he did not detach himself from the family. Ten years later he would go on to form the Presidential Security, being the boss and having several guards under his command.

Abre referred to Astesiano this Friday. “he was a good driver. But, he was neither my trust nor close to any kind of intimacy.“, said Abreu in informal breakfasts (channel 12) where he was consulted about the role that Astesiano had in the electoral campaign. Asked if he had hired the former custodian knowing that he had notes and records, Aladi’s general secretary replied: “Neither dreaming. And he wouldn’t have hired people who, despite not having those annotations, I had topics that were not about me… But it’s a general issue, of a general nature.”

Over the years, he gained the trust of Lacalle Pou and the president’s family. One of the images most remembered by his acquaintances is when he is seen jogging next to the cachila where the president and vice president were transferred on the day of the presidential inauguration, on March 1, 2020 from Parliament to the Executive Tower.

As custodian of the president, he would accompany him on some trips he had already traveled, until the president’s recent vacations in Costa Rica. Upon his return, on September 25, he was arrested at the presidential residence of Suárez y Reyes.

Today, away from the power and expensive lifestyle he used to lead, spends his days in Florida Unit 19 Behind bars.