Editor TLN
The former Peruvian president, Alejandro Toledo, exhausted all his resources this Thursday before the United States court. This Friday he must appear before the authorities to begin his official extradition process to Peru, where the court has issued an arrest warrant for money laundering charges in the Odebrecht case. Melissa Barra spoke with her Peruvian lawyer, José Roberto Su Rivadeneyra.
R.F.I.: You are a lawyer for former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo. This Thursday the US justice system rejected his last resort to suspend his extradition to Peru, where he faces corruption charges. Toledo has been under house arrest in California and this Friday morning he must turn himself in to a court. Is he willing to collaborate?
Jose Roberto Su Rivadeneira: I have the conversation with President Toledo, which he is going to make available to the judge, because in California the resources had already been exhausted. The judge’s order is that on Friday it should be put into law. Once the president makes himself available to the US authorities, the Peruvian authorities have to go to the United States to hand over President Toledo and then they have to transfer him to Peru. I understand that these procedures should take four or five days.
The former president filed a last appeal before the Federal Court of the District of Columbia and this was rejected. What have been the arguments of his defense to stop the extradition?
In the United States, to defense through a habeas corpus. He challenged Judge Thomas Hixson’s decision. The United States lawyers maintain that there is no probable cause because the versions that support the accusation in Peru are two testimonies from collaborators that contradict each other, unreliable, when the documentation maintains that Mr. Toledo did not receive the money accused of in the Peru. However, Judge Hixson considered in his decision that these contradictions were important, but it was not up to him to resolve or analyze them in depth, but to the judges of Peru. The habeas corpus has had this as an underlying issue, an undue motivation, but both in the first and second instance it has not walked. The defense arguments have not been accepted. That is why the extradition is about to take place.
Now, once it is located in Peru, what will be the next steps of Justice?
When the president arrives in Peru, here he has an active defense to face the trial for which he is being extradited, which is the Odebrecht case, which, by the way, is not a process that is up for trial, but rather just started the accusation control, which is a process that takes more or less six months or more. An arrest warrant weighs on him, a detention for 18 months. When he arrives in Peru he must go to a prison. However, according to the medical information that is handled, he is considering the possibility of suddenly being able to request that his detention be at home, but that depends on the medical reports that are being collected.
