They reveal that the number of detainees in Operation Squid increases to 20, but they keep four names in reserve
The Office of the Specialized Prosecutor for Administrative Persecution (Pepca) filed a request for preventive detention against the former candidate for the presidency and former minister of public works, the former administrative minister of the Presidency, the former finance minister and 17 other people arrested through Operation Squid.
The investigative body keeps under reserve the names of four people who it says are detained but their identities have not been revealed in the communications regarding the process.
He requests that the process followed by Gonzalo Castillo, José Ramón Peralta and Donald Guerrero be declared complex, whom he points out as leaders of a network of corruption that distracted taxpayers more than 17 billion pesos through the ministries under their charge and from other state entities.
Mirna Ortiz, litigation director of the Public Ministry, says that the file consists of 3,000 pages and 1,200 pieces of evidence that support the charges of criminal association, embezzlement, coalition of officials, falsification of public and private documents, bribery and illicit financing of campaign on an unprecedented scale, money laundering, among other crimes charged to the detainees.
In addition to the three former ministers, the attorney Ángel Lockward, former Comptroller General of the Republic, Daniel Omar Caamaño; the former director of the State Sugar Council (CEA), Luis Miguel Piccirilo; former director of the National Cadastre, Claudio Silver Peña, and former directors of Casinos and Gambling, Oscar Chalas Guerrero and Julián Omar Fernández.
Likewise, Roberto Santiago Moquete, Agustín Mejía Ávila, Emil Dávila Fernández, Marcial Reyes, Alejandro Constanzo, Yahaira Brito Encarnación and Ana Linda Fernández.
What does Pepca say?
According to the account of the Public Ministry to obtain an arrest and search warrant against the defendants, in 2019, before the Primary Elections of the Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), the then President of the Republic, Danilo Medina Sánchez, called a meeting in his office in the National Palace in which he instructed his closest officials, heads of ministries and general directorates, present, to seek money for the political campaigns of 2019, (internal to the PLD) and that of 2020 , knowing that this search was illegal.
He affirms that after that meeting, Peralta asked the then director of the Office of State Works Supervising Engineers (Oisoe), Francisco Pagán, to convene one of the main state builders, engineer Bolívar Ventura, who met with him in the National Palace, where Peralta tells him that he had to make a contribution to the campaign and that in exchange he would be made some payments of debts that he had with the State and that for purposes of coordinating the payments he had to go to the Minister of Finance Donald Guerrero.
Pepca refers that the criminal plan materialized by the then administrative minister and the Treasury, “used the companies of engineer Bolívar Ventura, which effectively benefited from the issuances nos. 2418,3015, 3629, 4089, 4162, 2610, 2765, 2770, 2771, 2773, 2774,2775, 2827, 3232, 3657 and 5207, through which it was released from the Ministry of Finance, assumed as administrative debt, obligation of the Treasury, payments for an approximate amount of RD$2,185,489,598.77, of which the engineer
exorbitant sum of money
The documentation states that, despite the exorbitant sum of money that Ventura gave to the criminal structure, the need to obtain more money for the internal political campaign and the 2020 general elections persisted.
For this reason, says PECA, Ramón Emilio Jiménez, alias Mimilo, in response to a point made by Donald Guerrero about an operation he had carried out and which is under investigation, told Fernando Crisóstomo that he had the files through from which public funds could be acquired to allocate them to political financing and, at the same time, unduly profit in a personal capacity, as well as profit from the other members of the alleged network to the detriment of public patrimony.
The modus operandi consisted of maneuvering to project payments under the concept of “payment of administrative debt” for the approximate amount of RD$31,147,053,422.15, for transactional agreements.
The Pepcadice that they have identified that they managed to steal approximately RD$12,000,000,000.00, for operations related to expropriation of land in protected areas, as well as the simulation of buying and selling land under the modality of administrative debts.
Doctors assisted those deprived of liberty
Relatives, friends and lawyers of the accused continued to arrive yesterday at the Ciudad Nueva Palace of Justice prison. Similarly, in the afternoon, medical personnel were observed going to the prison that operates in the Palace of Justice, where according to information, at least two of the detainees have health problems.
The search warrant mentions that in accordance with the need, the defendants appropriated most of the funds consigned in chapter 0999, Treasury obligations for the years 2019-2020, in particular the funds from sub-account 4.2.1.1 , in which expropriation payments that are being investigated were applied.
Puerto Rico
The governor of Puerto Rico, Pedro Pierluisi, offered “cooperation” to the Dominican authorities.
