2024-05-04 02:55:14
Just hours after receiving the preventive detention order for the crime of influence peddling Francisco Sebastián BA, son of Vice President Verónica Abad, the National Service for Attention to Persons Deprived of Liberty (SNAI) decided to transfer the defendant from Quito to the province of Guayas, to the so-called prison The rock.
The transfer of the professional lawyer took place after 1:00 p.m. this Friday, March 22. At 01:20 this Friday, Judge María Fernanda Castro, of the Specialized Unit for Corruption and Organized Crime, decided to accept the 19 elements of conviction presented by prosecutor Carlos Leonardo Alarcón, of the Transparency and Fight Against Crime Unit. Corruption, and not only begin the 90 days of prosecutorial investigation, but also order the precautionary measure of preventive detention against the suspect.
The judge left in the hands of the SNAI the Center for Deprivation of Liberty (CPL) to which Francisco Sebastián BA is taken, who has been denounced for apparently contacting Romel P., along with an alleged advisor to the Vice Presidency of the Republic to offer him a communication coordinator position in that institution. The proposal included that of the $3,200 salary that he was going to receive, he should give them $2,000.
According to the victim’s story, which would be part of the file, he would have started working as a public official in the Vice Presidency of the Republic, in December 2023. On the night of December 8, 2023, the injured party would have met with Francisco Sebastián BA and another person, in a hotel in Quito. Both people allegedly offered him a general coordinator job within the public service, with a salary of $3,200. “However, the victim had to deliver approximately $2,000 to Francisco Sebastián BA,” said the Prosecutor’s Office.
After a negotiation they would have agreed that the complainant today had to give his “contractors” only $1,500 and he could keep $1,700. To ensure the monthly payment, those who offered him the job made Romel P. sign a bill for $30,600, who had problems covering what was agreed for the months of December 2023 and January 2024. The bill would be used as backup for the total amount that had to be paid in a period of one year.
When the complainant was left with little money from his monthly payment, he requested that the first two bills be accumulated so that he could pay them in February 2024, but that could not be because Romel P. received the notification of his separation from the Vice Presidency of the Republic. With that fact, the former public official at that time demanded that the bill of exchange be given to him, but Francisco Sebastián BA did not do so, as he said that that document should be burned.
Romel P. would have made his complaint through the transparency mailbox of the Prosecutor’s Office and from that a preliminary investigation was launched in which a judge ordered follow-ups to be carried out on the son of Vice President Abad. Among the elements of conviction that the prosecutor in the case claimed to have would be a photograph of the bill of exchange that is half burned and even audios, videos and transcripts that would corroborate the complaint made.
The offer to carry out influence peddling is classified in article 286 of the Comprehensive Organic Penal Code (COIP) and is punishable by imprisonment of three to five years.
Hours before the transfer, Oswaldo Trujillo, Francisco Sebastián BA’s lawyer, presented the respective appeal to the preventive detention order issued against his client. According to him, the Prosecutor’s Office did not justify that there is a procedural risk and believes that there are other less burdensome measures that can be applied against the person under investigation. The principles of proportionality and necessity are those that, according to the lawyer, should be reviewed by senior judges who hear the appeal to order an alternative measure to preventive detention.
Constant trips abroad in the last year and having her mother working in Israel, since since December 10, 2023 she has been the ambassador of Ecuador in Tel Aviv, are elements that for the prosecutor in the case suggest a possible flight risk. .
For security reasons, it was not reported by which route the defendant is transferred to Guayaquil. In this case called Nene, the tax instruction will last 90 days.