President Alberto Fernández accepted on Thursday night the resignation of the ambassador to Israel Sergio Urribarri. He did so after the Justice of Entre Ríos sentenced him to 8 years in prison for fraudulent administration.
Urribarri had made his resignation available after the decision of an Entre Ríos Court of Trials and Appeals was known to sentence him to 8 years in prison and lifelong disqualification in an oral and public trial for the diversion of public funds between 2010 and 2015 , when he was governor of the coastal province.
The former provincial chief expressed from his social networks that the ruling of the first instance is a “clear example of arbitrariness, injustice and violation of the rule of law”, for which he anticipated that he will appeal with the “conviction that reason assists me”, He stated via Twitter.
the trial
The Court of Trials and Appeals of the Entre Ríos province sentenced Urribarri to 8 years of effective imprisonment for “negotiations incompatible with the public function, embezzlement and breach of the duties of a public official“committed during his tenure, between 2007 and 2015.
The determination was made by judges José María Chemez, Carolina Castagno and Elvio Garzón, who also applied to the former provincial president absolute perpetual disqualification from holding public office, and a fine of 180,000 pesos.
The magistrates considered that provincial funds were used for a “purely private interest”, in reference to a “campaign to position the image of Urribarri as a candidate for president” in the 2015 elections. Hiring of companies for requested publications , for the installation of a beach inn in Mar del Plata, to broadcast promotional spots for the Mercosur Summit held in Paraná in 2014, and for street and in newspapers and magazines are some of the main cases in which the prosecution investigated alleged embezzlement of funds.