Roxana Baldetti was a controversial official, due to the way she expressed herself and her way of acting. She was involved in politics since the beginning of this century and had a rapid rise. However, her power was ephemeral and vanished due to accusations of corruption, which keep her in prison.
The former vice president was one of the founders of the Partido Patriota, a group that formally emerged in 2002 and quickly began to occupy power quotas in the State. A year after its appearance, the political organization won its first seats in the Congress of the Republic and one of them was assigned to Baldetti.
It was there that she began her political career, one that allowed her to be part of the Board of Directors of Congress and head of the block of the extinct orange group. Her period in the Legislature ended in 2011, when she resigned from her position to run for the presidential duo of the Partido Patriota.
It was the beginning of the end of her career. Although she managed to be elected vice president, she did not manage to complete the term for which she was appointed, after the Special Prosecutor’s Office against Impunity (FECI) and the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) accused her of committing multiple crimes.
Officials from the Superintendency of Tax Administration (SAT) and agents external to this structure were involved in this mechanism.
Since 2014, these agencies have identified a smuggling network involving importers and customs brokers who carried out illegal operations to evade paying taxes. According to the investigations, the structure provided a telephone number called “the line.”
Involved in this mechanism were officials from the Superintendency of Tax Administration (SAT) and agents external to this structure, whose connections reached the highest spheres of national politics and where one of those involved was Juan Carlos Monzón, Baldetti’s private secretary.
Roxana Baldetti with President Otto Pérez Molina on April 22, 2015, during a meeting with the diplomatic corps. (Photo Prensa Libre: PL Archives)
The Line
The existence of the customs fraud network was revealed on April 16, 2015. That day, 19 people were arrested, including Omar Franco and Carlos Muñoz, former heads of the SAT. They were arrested on charges of belonging to a structure that defrauded the treasury at customs and that received, for that activity, Q2.5 million weekly.
To do so, the importer only paid 70% of the total taxes that he had to pay to the treasury. Of that amount, 40% remained in the state coffers and the remaining 30% was a bribe for the members of the criminal group. The presentation of the investigation generated controversy due to Monzón’s involvement.
However, the first statement hearing of the 19 detainees caused a greater stir, because it was mentioned in the proceedings that the criminal group also included characters who were given nicknames such as “the number one”, “the president”, “the top guy”, “the r”, “the lady”, “the big lady” or “the two”.
Everything pointed to the presidential binomial. In less than 10 days after the investigation was exposed, mass demonstrations began demanding the resignation of Otto Pérez Molina and Baldetti. The government collapsed and the pressure from citizens, businessmen and the international community forced the then vice president to resign.
On August 24, 2015, Roxana Baldetti testified before the High Risk Court B. (Photo Prensa Libre: PL Archives)
It was May 8 and Pérez Molina announced her resignation. He said that the former deputy’s decision was “personal, thoughtful, difficult and brave.” Three months later she was arrested for being part of “La Línea.” She was the first vice president of the country and the first to hold that position to be convicted of acts of corruption.
While Baldetti was in prison at the Santa Teresa detention center in Zone 18 of the capital, she was notified on February 23, 2016 that she was linked to another investigation, in which she was the leader of a criminal organization that defrauded the State of Q22.83 million under the pretext of cleaning up Lake Amatitlán.
This deal was made with the Israeli company M Tarcic Engineering LTDA and one of the operators of the transaction, according to the FECI and the CICIG, was the brother of the former vice president: Mario Alejandro Baldetti Elías, who did not hold a public office, but who controlled the Authority for the Sustainable Management of the Amatitlán Basin and Lake.
The agency purchased the “special liquid made in Israel” that the former official said would be used to clean the body of water, a formula that included salt water, hydrogen peroxide, pine extracts, garlic, seaweed and ethanol. This did not decontaminate the lake and the former congresswoman’s promise to eat mojarras from the lake was also not fulfilled.
On the contrary, the FECI and the CICIG identified a series of irregularities in the acquisition. For example, the product had no health registration, there was no environmental impact study for it, nor scientific documentation to support its application. All of this led to Baldetti being convicted.
Former Vice President Roxana Baldetti is transferred to the Matamoros military base prison after hearing the reasons for her arrest in the La Línea case, on August 28, 2015. (Photo Prensa Libre: PL Archives)
Co-optation of the State
La Línea was the investigation that gave rise to this new case, presented on June 2, 2016. It became the largest case presented by the CICIG and the FECI. By then, the government of the Partido Patriota had ended and its main leaders had accumulated multiple accusations of corruption.
On this occasion, the former vice president was accused of being part of an extensive network that, since 2008, was dedicated to raising funds irregularly to finance the electoral campaign of the orange group and then used them to collect illegal commissions for the allocation of contracts, works and services.
Authorities indicated that this machinery, in which several companies and contractors were involved, allowed Baldetti to come to power and obtain economic benefits of all kinds. The investigation even detailed that just by collecting bribes for the processing of new or ongoing contracts, the structure could have received Q500 million.
This investigation, due to the magnitude of the events, was divided into two other phases. The first was the Quetzal Container Terminal, which revealed that Spanish investors, allegedly with bribes, obtained a portion of Puerto Quetzal. The second was La Coperacha, which claimed that various officials entertained the presidential duo with expensive gifts bought with illicit money.
The second was La Coperacha, which claimed that various officials entertained the presidential duo with expensive gifts bought with illicit money. These stages were combined into a single case: the Cooptación del Estado case, in which it has yet to be decided whether the former congresswoman should face trial.
Baldetti had been in prison for almost three years when she was implicated in a new corruption case, this time for the creation of a series of phantom positions in the Cadastral Information Registry (RIC), a small institution that allegedly served to pay political favors.
This case was revealed on May 15, 2018. This was the last case for which Baldetti was brought to justice and was again developed by the FECI and the CICIG, which already had friction with the government of Jimmy Morales and was approaching the end of its mandate.
The court file stated that a list of people were hired at the aforementioned institution on the direct instructions of the former vice president and her private secretary, Juan Carlos Monzón. To do so, they needed a group of officials who could carry out such actions within the state agency.
The investigation revealed that the positions were filled in three ways: the contracted person kept a percentage of the salary and the rest was given to the person who referred them; the contracted person kept the salary without working; and the contracted person carried out activities for the person who referred them, while the Registry paid their salary.
Drug trafficking
After the long criminal proceedings that Baldetti is facing in the country are concluded, she will have to be transferred to the United States and face justice in that country, which accuses her of criminal association and conspiracy to transport cocaine to the North American nation.
The accusation alleges that the former vice president received money from Los Zetas, large gifts from that drug cartel, and security from this criminal group during the 2011 election campaign. In exchange, the former official promised to give drug traffickers freedom to transport illicit substances by any means in Guatemala.
Baldetti agreed to be sent to the US, although she denied the charges against her. She said that the extradition was “revenge” for the “good things” she did while in politics. However, while she resolves her legal matters in the country, the District of Columbia Court is patiently awaiting her arrival.
“There were reports that were rated in the opposite way to what they said. For example, they said ‘white’, but they rated it ‘black’, when the literal meaning of the report stated something else.”
César Calderón, Baldetti’s lawyer in some of the proceedings
There were “vices”
Attorney César Calderón, who has assisted Baldetti in the presentation of special appeals in the La Línea and Agua Mágica cases, said there were “terrible” flaws in the sentences imposed against the former official.
“There were reports that were rated in the opposite way to what they said. For example, they said ‘white’, but they rated it ‘black’, when the literal meaning of the report stated something else,” said the professional.
The defense attorney did not provide many details about the errors allegedly committed in the verdict, but he said that due to these there are reasons to annul the convictions. He even said that Baldetti had no involvement in the Agua Mágica case.
Roxana Baldetti arrives at the San Juan de Dios Hospital on November 2, 2015 due to health problems. (Photo by Prensa Libre: PL Archives)
On Monday, December 5, 2022, the former president and former president Otto Pérez arrive at the High Risk Court B at the end of the La Línea trial. (Photo Prensa Libre: PL Archives).
On June 22, 2015, Roxana Baldetti slipped on the stairs of the Court Tower, after requesting the High Risk Court to remove the embargo on seven bank accounts worth Q6.6 million. (Photo Prensa Libre: PL Archives)
Extinguished assets
As her criminal proceedings progressed, the former vice president lost various assets that she obtained illegally. For example, three farms located in Santa Catarina Pinula passed into the hands of the State. These properties were valued at more than Q15 million.
The former deputy lost another property in the same municipality, which was valued at Q18 million. In this town, the former vice president had a mansion worth Q19.15 million in the Los Eucaliptos neighborhood, which is now owned by the State, as is her luxurious home worth Q12.42 million in La Cañada, zone 14 of the capital.
Baldetti was also stripped of a house in the Lomas de Pamplona neighborhood in zone 13 of the city and a warehouse in that same area. Also, an apartment, three parking spaces, a warehouse and a share of the Casa Margarita building, which is in zone 10 of the capital. The estimated value of these assets is Q10 million.
The parade of properties that were extinguished was completed by a mansion in Roatán, Honduras, for which she had paid an advance of US$229 thousand; in addition to eleven properties valued at US$895 thousand, consisting of offices, an apartment, parking lots and warehouses, which are located in zones 10 and 15 of the capital.
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