2023-08-03 09:44:26
Nicolás Petro Burgos earned 13 million pesos ($3,200) a month, but he spent as if he earned 200 million ($50,000). That is one of the conclusions of the Colombian Prosecutor’s Office, which on Tuesday charged the son of President Gustavo Petro for alleged money laundering and illicit enrichment.
Representative of the department of Atlántico, Nicolás Petro and his ex-wife Daysuris Vásquez were captured on Saturday in the city of Barranquilla and transferred to Bogotá.
LOOK: What is Nicolás Petro accused of, the son of the president of Colombia who was arrested, and how can it affect the Government?
“I think that we would all have ourselves elected as deputies, 200 million pesos, please! Mr. Nicolás, you do not have any other economic activity that generates income, none. In fact, Mr. Nicolás, in his income statements presented for the year 2020 and 2021, he stated that he only had income derived from his work as a deputy for the Atlantic Assembly, with assets for the year 2020 of 52’800,000 pesos,” said the prosecutor Mario Burgos, according to the magazine Week.
“He earned 13 million pesos, a full salary of approximately 18,700,000 pesos as a deputy,” continued the prosecutor, who assured that this was his only source of income.
Nicolás Petro Burgos and his ex-wife Daysuris Vásquez on Tuesday in Bogotá, during the hearing for charges. (EFE).
The harsh account made by the prosecutor of the evidence he has ended up breaking Nicolás Petro, who with tears in his eyes declared before a judge that he is willing to cooperate with justice, according to a review of the accusation published by the newspaper Time.
“I want to announce to Colombia that we have decided to start a collaboration process, where I will refer to new facts and situations that will help justice. I do it for my family and for my baby, who is on the way,” said Petro Burgos.
Two hours earlier, in the indictment proceeding, Nicolás Petro had pleaded not guilty by not accepting the charges read to him by the prosecutor, El Tiempo reported.
Before he made the decision to collaborate, the prosecutor Mario Burgos had offered him to accept his responsibility to receive a reduction of 50% of the possible sentence that would fall once morest him.
Prosecutor Burgos said that the penalty for money laundering and illicit enrichment is regarding 12 years in prison.
The Prosecutor’s Office also accused the ex-wife Daysuris Vásquez of money laundering and violation of personal data.
Nicolás Petro, Daysuris Vásquez and Gustavo Petro.
According to prosecutor Burgos, the convicted drug trafficker Samuel Santander Lopesierra gave Nicolás Petro regarding 400 million pesos ($102,000).
While Alfonso “El turco” Hilsaca, a businessman accused in the past by the prosecution of financing paramilitary groups and planning homicides, would have given him the same amount, according to the prosecutor.
This Thursday there will be a new hearing, where the country hopes to find out what will be the new elements that Nicolás Petro will contribute to lower his possible sentence.
“How much can the denunciations that deputy Nicolás Petro will deliver to the Prosecutor’s Office destabilize Gustavo Petro? It is curious that the ‘soft coup’ that the government was talking regarding did not take place, but instead a ‘hard coup’ that comes from the same presidential family is taking place,” political analyst Juan Carlos Flórez wrote on Twitter.
The EFE agency recalled that the illegal financing of political campaigns returned to public discussion in June, following Armando Benedetti, then ambassador to Venezuela who was key to Petro’s electoral victory in 2022 on the Atlantic coast, threatened to reveal what who knows regarding the illegal financing of that campaign.
File photo dated August 7, 2022, showing Nicolás Petro Burgos, son of President Gustavo Petro, together with his ex-wife Day Vásquez, at the president’s inauguration ceremony. (EFE/Mauricio Dueñas Castañeda/FILE).
A millionaire’s life
Prosecutor Burgos assured on Tuesday that the money received by Nicolás Petro was used to buy a mansion of 1.650 million pesos (408,000 dollars) in Barranquilla.
“That property, you, Mr. Nicolás Petro and Daysuris Vásquez, received a lease, but then jointly stated with Mrs. Daysuris del Carmen their intention to purchase, agreeing on a total value of 1,650 million pesos, which is why the promise of sale, appearing as buyer Mr. Cesar Emilio Vásquez Buendía (Day’s uncle),” said the prosecutor.
For this property, Nicolás would have paid an advance of 699 million pesos.
According to the prosecutor, he also negotiated the purchase of a house in Tubará (Atlántico) for 334 million pesos (83,000 dollars).
In addition, Nicolás Petro bought a luxurious Mercedes Benz car for 200 million pesos (50,000 dollars), an amount that he paid in cash. The vehicle was transferred to the name of Daysuris Vásquez, to later put it in the name of her father and her sister, who would not have the economic capacity to assume said expense.
According to the investigation, Nicolás Petro made purchases and paid cash in luxury stores such as Salvatore Ferragamo and Carolina Herrera.
The prosecutor pointed out inconsistencies between his tax returns and his bank movements.
For example, he said that in 2022 he received 251.4 million pesos ($64,000) for his work as a deputy, but he supposedly spent 1.6 billion ($408,000).
“Where does that money come from to your coffers?” Asked the prosecutor.
“None of this is wages or leasing,” said the prosecutor, who recalled that in 2022 Petro Burgos’ total income was 280,331,394 pesos (regarding $70,000).
In total, according to the Prosecutor’s Office, in 2022 Nicolás Petro would have illegally increased his assets by 1,053 million pesos (263,000 dollars). “They are not the result of his work, but of the clandestine income of money from 2021 to the end of 2022,” Burgos said.
Besides…
The chats that finished burying him
Nicholas Petro Burgosa lawyer by profession, was married to daysuris vasquez since 2019, but in 2022 it became known regarding their separation following his infidelity.
In March 2023, Dayssuris Vásquez gave Semana magazine the alleged conversations she had with her ex-husband through WhatsApp.
“We urgently have to get dollars out of here,” Nicolás Petro claimed to Vásquez a few hours before his father’s electoral triumph, in the second round of the elections on June 19, 2022.
According to the woman, Nicolás Petro used the money to buy a mansion in Barranquilla. Semana reviewed the chats, where money is one of the most recurring topics. For example, on February 9, 2022, at 12:57 p.m., Nicolás wrote to Dayssuris asking them to urgently use the resources to purchase the house for fear that the money would be stolen.
Semana also referred that Nicholas He expressed his fear for the bulk of the money that was to be guarded and spoke with his wife regarding a suitcase where the bills were. She told him that, for security reasons, part of the money was hidden “elsewhere”. Nicolás, that same February 9, insisted once more on buying the house “to get out of that”, in reference to the money in cash.
In the chats it is clear that the house cost 1,600 million pesos (regarding 408,000 dollars).
“It would look like this: 1,600 million. 50% for the signing of the promise and 50% at the time of writing, which would be at the time of finalizing the lease contract or before by mutual agreement”, Dayssuris told Nicolás in one of the WhatsApp conversations.
1691056401
#Nicolás #Petro #bought #mansion #apartment #Mercedes #Benz #luxury #accessories #year #tax #accusation #son #Colombian #President #Gustavo #Petro #WORLD
