Former Ecuadorian President To be Arrested!
Guayaquil, Ecuador, Sep 3 (EFE).-
An Ecuadorian court on Thursday ordered the arrest of former President Abdalá Bucaram (1996-1997), who is hospitalized following surgery, so he can attend the hearing at which judges will announce a verdict in a case alleging organized crime in which he is accused along with his son, Jacobo, and two other people.
The judges made the decision after the trial hearing could not be reconvened for a sixth time because the former president was hospitalized again. His lawyers said he has not recovered from surgery he underwent Aug. 25.
The arrest will not be immediate because Bucaram is in intensive care, but the judges ordered police to maintain “permanent surveillance” so that he can hear the verdict once he leaves the hospital.
This is the third time the hearing has been declared unable to proceed because of issues related to the former president’s health. The first was Aug. 26, when his lawyers and relatives announced that he had been hospitalized in an emergency for heart surgery.
He left the hospital several days later but was admitted to a different facility Monday, the same day the hearing was scheduled to take place. It was postponed until Thursday, when his defense attorneys again said he was at a new medical center.
Police went to the new hospital in northern Guayaquil on Thursday afternoon, where doctors confirmed that Bucaram was hospitalized. The officers were unable to see him because he was in intensive care.
Prosecutors accuse the former president, his son and two other people of “collaborating, between March and August 2020, with a criminal structure that obtained economic benefits through the sale of 21,000 tests to detect Covid-19 and other medical supplies during the health emergency.”
According to the investigation, two Israelis — one of whom was killed in 2020 at Litoral Penitentiary, the country’s largest and most dangerous prison, in Guayaquil — allegedly were responsible for moving the tests under the custody of traffic officers to the former president’s home. Bucaram “also stored other medical supplies, such as masks and lancets for taking samples,” according to the prosecution.
A total of 50 people, including experts and witnesses, testified in the trial, which began April 11 last year after several postponements dating back to 2022.
The court also ordered the Health Ministry to audit reports issued by the hospitals where the former president has been treated and, if necessary, seek investigations into the medical facilities for alleged obstruction of justice. EFE
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