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Ricardo Martinelli and Juan Carlos Varela will face the bench in a process that will begin in August 2023 under accusations of receiving bribes from the Brazilian company. Along with them, another 34 individuals were charged. Government officials during the Martinelli period and his two sons stand out on that list. In contrast, one person was definitively dismissed and another 11 provisionally.
This Tuesday, November 8, the Panamanian justice announced that 36 people will face a trial for alleged money laundering corresponding to the Odebrecht case, described as the most corrupt in the history of the Central American country.
Within the payroll, two former presidents of the country stand out: Ricardo Martinelli (2009-2014) and Juan Carlos Varela (2014-2019). The process will take place next August.
However, they are not the only political figures whose name appeared on the red list drawn up by the Judicial Branch on Monday night.
Also involved are five former ministers from the Martinelli administration and their two sons, Ricardo Alberto and Luis Enrique, who remain imprisoned in the United States for acknowledging that they received 28 million dollars in bribes, and one from the Varela Administration.
According to the EFE agency, Jaime Ford and Federico Suárez (Public Works), Frank de Lima (Economy), Demetrio Papadimitriu (Presidency) and José Domingo Arias (Housing), who made up Martinelli’s Cabinet, were cited in the judicial document. While Carlos Duboy, also from Housing, is the official of the Varela era.
The Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office managed to call 36 people to trial, including 2 former presidents of the Republic, 6 former ministers, 2 children of a former president (2009-2014), and other former officials, businessmen and individuals for money laundering, per case #Odebrecht. pic.twitter.com/6jBdy75I4M
— Public Ministry (@PGN_PANAMA) November 8, 2022
In a brief message through its social networks, the Public Ministry highlighted the “call to trial” of these three dozen people, in which there are also minor officials, businessmen and individuals.
In this case, which is in the hands of Judge Baloísa Marquínez of the Third Criminal Court, Papadimitriu’s mother and 11 others were provisionally dismissed.
In the Odebrecht case, which had its preliminary hearing in mid-September, the prosecutor Mahmad Daud Hasan remarked that the Brazilian construction company paid bribes “right and left” in Panama, where it has been based since 2006 and became one of the contracting entities principals of the state.
Meanwhile, in July 2017, the company signed an agreement with the Panamanian Prosecutor’s Office, in which it promised to pay a fine of 220 million dollars to the State over 12 years, but these compensations are not being executed.
Rescheduling in Mexico and Peru
Beyond the advances of the Panamanian Justice in the Odebrecht case, this week rescheduling was set for the sessions in Mexico and Peru.
The defenders of Emilio Lozoya, former director of Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) between 2012 and 2016 and the maximum implicated in the case, managed to postpone the intermediate hearing for ten days.
Lawyer Miguel Ontiveros justified the decision by explaining that the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic has not delivered the evidentiary file nor do they have all the evidence that was exposed.
While the magistrates of Peru rescheduled for January the testimonies of Marcelo Odebrecht, Jorge Barata and other former leaders of the company in the arc of the trial against former president Ollanta Humala.
with EFE
