The Court of Appeals of Santiago maintained the preventive detention of the mayor of Recoleta Daniel Jadue, accused by the Public Ministry as the author of the completed crimes of unfair administration, fraud, repeated treasury fraud and a bankruptcy crime.
The appeal court also ratified the decision that decreed the preventive detention of José Matias Muñoz Becerra, former executive secretary of the Chilean Association of Pharmacies (Achifarp), accused of being the author of the crimes of bribery committed by a public employee, disloyal administration, tax fraud repeated and misappropriation of public funds.
In the resolution, the Fourth Chamber of the Court of Appeals—made up of Justices Jessica González, Lilian Leyton and Justice Tomás Gray—shared the arguments of the Third Guarantee Court regarding the need for caution and confirmed the decision that on June 3 The past decreed the preventive detention of the accused.
The arguments between prosecutor Giovanna Herrera, Jadue’s lawyer, Ramón Sepúlveda, and the plaintiffs in the case lasted almost seven hours. After this, the judges began to analyze their resolution. The defense sought to change the precautionary measure of the communal leader and Communist Party activist, who is under said precautionary measure in the Captain Yáber Penitentiary Annex.
“The only measure that is proportional to the purposes of the procedure”
“This court shares the foundations contained in the resolution being reviewed, since the first-degree judge analyzes the criteria of social danger that the legislator enshrines in letter c) of article 140 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, that is, the number of crimes charged, the legal assets protected, the probable legal sanction, the civil servant quality of the accused, all of which allows us to conclude that these qualified antecedents determine that the only measure that is proportional to the purposes of the procedure is preventive detention, as rightly stated. reasons in the appeal resolution, without this being the instance to analyze the concurrence of circumstances modifying criminal responsibility that could occur in the species,” the ruling states.
The court added that “it cannot fail to warn that the conduct of the accused Jadue is even more reprehensible if one considers his current role as the highest authority in the Municipality of Recoleta and by virtue of which he carried out the punishable acts that are now the subject of persecution. penal, especially if he always had power of decision and direction both in Achifarp and in the building entity, especially if he was the creator and main leader of that association.
Jadue’s lawyer, Ramón Sepúlveda, said that Judge Paulina Moya’s resolution does not comply with regulatory requirements and accused the Prosecutor’s Office of “blindness.”
Lawyer Mario Vargas, representative of Best Quality, the company complaining of fraud against Jadue, expressed optimism regarding maintaining preventive detention, highlighting the forcefulness of the judicial resolution. On the other hand, Christian Espejo, another plaintiff lawyer, criticized Jadue’s defense argument about the state of health of her mother, arguing that “she does not need Jadue free. The country needs Jadue deprived of liberty.”
Consult the ruling of the Court of Appeals of Santiago.
