The Supreme Court of Justice, gathered in the Constitutional Chamber, agrees with Judgment 163 issued by the Criminal Chamber, through which a dismissal issued in favor of three people accused of the crimes of extortion and association to commit crimes was annulled. The three defendants are identified as José Celestino Albornoz Martínez, Katiusca José del Valle Albornoz Martínez and Beatriz Liliana García Aurrecoechea.
They were denounced on February 23, 2018 before the National Antiextory and Kidnapping Command (Conas) by Ydanys Trinidad Contreras Figuera. Ydanys told the officials that he was being the victim of “deception and psychoterror” by José, Katiuska and Beatriz, who made him believe that there was an arrest warrant, which would be executed by the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (Sebin), but that they could solve that issue for the sum of 50,000 dollars.
He also told Conas that she had to inform her partner José Celestino Albornoz about the extortion of which she was a victim by her sister, Katiuska José Albornoz. In this regard, José Celestino replied that it was best to deliver the $ 50,000 “because Beatriz Liliana had many contacts. ”
Following that complaint, José, Katiuska and Beatriz were captured in Barcelona on 4/4/18 by agents of the General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (DGCIM). At the following two months, the Public Ministry, represented in Efrén Eduardo Beltrán Mata, requested to open a trial from José, Katiuska and Beatriz for considering that they are incursive in the crimes of extortion and association to commit crimes. This approach was dismissed by the 1st State and Municipal Control Court of Anzoátegui, based in Barcelona, which gave them a dismissal and decreed full freedom.
Such a decision was appealed by the Prosecutor’s Office, represented in Javier Enrique Gutiérrez Uribe, but such a appeal was declared without place on October 30, 2018 by the Court of Appeals of Anzoátegui, whose three judges ratified the dismissal issued by the Municipal Court in favor of José, Katiuska and Beatriz.
The Public Ministry insists on bringing the three defendants to trial and therefore goes to the Criminal Chamber of the TSJ to annul the judgment of the Court of Appeals that had apparently trant the possibility of such claim. In response to that request, on August 7, 2019, the Criminal Chamber annulled the Judgment of the Court of Appeals of Anzoátegui, thus opening the possibility that the three defendants be prosecuted, as read in Judgment 163.
And it is precisely that judgment of the Criminal Chamber that they requested is reviewed with a view to their annulment. Such request was raised before the Constitutional Chamber by the lawyers of Beatriz Liliana García Aurrecohea, one of the three accused of having extorted Yanys Contreras.
In that sense, the magistrates of the Constitutional Chamber analyzed the reasons raised by the defendant and considered that he is not right, because “in the judgment subject to review, the Criminal Cassation Chamber of this High Court resolved in accordance with law”.
They stressed that the judgment of the Criminal Chamber questioned by the defendant Beatriz Liliana García Aurrecoechea “was issued according to the exercise of his sovereign power.”
The scolding to the court
The Court of Appeals of Anzoátegui was subject to a reprimand by the Criminal Chamber of the TSJ in August 2019. On that occasion, the magistrates of the Criminal Chamber observed that the aforementioned Court did not fulfill their duty to monitor the application of the law made by the 1st Court of Control of Anzoátegui, an instance that favored the three accused of extortion with a dismissal.
The magistrates say that this Court of Appeals was limited to cutting and hitting the arguments that the aforementioned court had to favor the defendants, “breaking their duty to examine the legal support of the logical trial of which the aforementioned court would have been served, whereby the dismissal decreed.”
