2023-12-14 19:36:44
The president of the Judicial Council of Ecuador, Wilman Terán, was arrested this Thursday as an alleged part of a large corruption plot with infiltrations of drug trafficking in the judicial, prison and police system, and which involves 30 investigated, including senior judges, prosecutors, police, lawyers and criminals.
In a message published on social networks, the attorney general, Diana Salazar, anticipated that she will file charges for alleged organized crime against Terán and thirty other people investigated within the so-called “Metastasis” case, named for the extent of this apparent plot. of corruption at different levels of the State.
Terán’s arrest was carried out as part of a large operation carried out in the early hours of this Thursday that involved more than 75 home raids in 7 of the country’s 24 provinces and which involved the deployment of more than 900 people, including prosecutors and police.
Terán broadcast the moment of his arrest on social networks, which he described as “without any basis.”
“Respectful of the law, I will defend myself. With this persecution they have destroyed the judicial career,” added Terán, whose home was raided and searched, as well as the offices of the Judiciary Council, the governing, administrative and disciplinary body of the Power. Judicial.
A few hours earlier, in another video message broadcast on social networks, the president of the Judiciary Council had warned about this operation, which he said “lacks all legitimacy and only obeys interests to hit and destabilize Justice and , therefore, to democracy.
Terán affirms that the operation aims to avoid purging the Judiciary
“Here I am, here I am, I’m in my office and I’m not hiding anything,” said Terán, who stated that this operation seeks to avoid his intention to purge the Judiciary.
This episode occurs in the midst of strong tensions over Terán’s permanence in office, after the Council for Citizen Participation and Citizen Participation (CPCCS) appointed him in February and the National Court of Justice withdrew confidence in him in August.
In parallel, the ‘correismo’ tries to promote in the National Assembly (Parliament) a political trial to remove the attorney general, after having brought the accusation in previous years that led to her disqualification and sentence of eight years in prison for bribery. that weighs against former president Rafael Correa (2007-2017).
Salazar explained that this investigation involving Terán arises from the murder in prison last year of Leandro Norero, one of the alleged biggest drug traffickers in Ecuador.
From that event “indications emerged of a criminal structure embedded in all levels of the State and directly linked to drug trafficking,” stated the attorney general.
“(The) leaders of the criminal structure had money obtained from illegal activities and located corrupt officials who carried out their processes to obtain undue advantages in a system consumed by the cancer of corruption,” he added.
Salazar considered that “the ‘Metastasis’ case is a clear x-ray of how drug trafficking has taken over the institutions of the State, to operate through ill-gotten money from judicial and political bodies and achieve impunity in some cases.”
The prosecutor emphasized that “today the term ‘narcopolitics’ has been evident and is no longer distant, because we can see how criminal structures have permeated the institutions to achieve their objectives, and surely the response to this operation will be an escalation of violence”.
Among the other detainees are former criminal judge Ronald Guerrero and retired Police General Pablo Ramírez, who was director of the national penitentiary system and later director of the Police Anti-Narcotics Unit.
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