Global Courant
New details about the corruption card scandal have emerged. Now the past of the employees who own the plastics used to arrest Julio “Chocolate” Rigau is coming to light. These are people with extensive experience in the Buenos Aires legislature and with connections to various political parties.
48 people appear to be holders of the debit cards that Rigau had kept in a bag when he was arrested on September 9 due to his suspicious and repeated movements at an electronic ATM in the center of La Plata.
According to the files of these almost fifty employees, some of them had more than 20 years of experience in the Chamber of Deputies of the Province of Buenos Aires. Over the course of their careers, they even held roles related to the Chamber’s presidency or vice-presidency.
According to documents seen by Telenoche, the people hired appear on the payroll as belonging to a department called the “Political Bloc.”
Cecilia Nora Raimondo and Daniel Alfredo Madero joined in September 2004. The first, within the Federalist Unity Party. The other within the Front for Victory, although it went to Cambiemos in 2017.
The file of Juan Martín Mendez, one of the holders of the corruption cards. Photo: courtesy of TN
Another file published at this time shows the path of Juan Martín Méndez: he joined the Renovador Front in 2016 (according to official documents) and moved to Cambiemos in 2017.
At the time of his arrest, “Chocolate” Rigau was carrying a garbage bag in which nearly 1.2 million pesos were found. He also kept the 48 debit cards in other smaller bags.
He was arrested but, in a scandalous verdict, released just twelve days later. Juan Alberto Benavides and Alejandro Gustavo Villordo of the Court of Criminal Appeals in La Plata considered that the police did not have a “warrant” to intervene, so they annulled the proceedings and the leader was released.
Rigau has a long history as a leader and local point of reference for the Justicialista party. They estimate he earned 28 million pesos a month. It is estimated that the salary of each employee was 500,000 pesos.
Video
The images of the Peronist leader who triggered the debit card scandal in the Buenos Aires legislature were published by Telenoche.
The investigations against cardholders are a central point. The thing is, if it moves forward, they could be considered “participants,” so the coverage would be changed to “misappropriation of public funds.” However, things have stopped for now.
How the corruption card case affected the Buenos Aires legislature
On behalf of the prosecutor Betina Lacki, a case of “fraud” was opened before the Guarantee Court Federico Atencio. However, Benavides and Villordo’s decision stopped the file. In addition, none of the 48 employees had filed a lawsuit against Rigau.
To get the case back on track, the NGO Poder Ciudadano asked Judge Atencio to appear as plaintiff. They are based on “the power of collective or diffuse victims to constitute themselves as parties in a criminal procedure”.
Given the risk of Chocolate leaving the country, it emerged that the Attorney General’s Office, led by Héctor Vogliolo, would file a cassation appeal. They assume that given the weakness of the arguments and the apparent presence of openness, the file will almost automatically be returned to the original judge.
In addition to an eventual change of cover, the reactivation of the case would allow an expansion of the investigation against Claudio and Facundo Albini (political references of “Chocolate”), as well as the highest authorities of the Buenos Aires legislature: Carlos “Cuto” Moreno and Federico Otermin (from Kirchnerism ); Adrián Urrelli (from PRO); and Miguel De Lisi (from PJ).
For now, major political circles are keeping quiet about the scandal.
Only the national deputy Ricardo López Murphy, the mayor of Capitán Sarmiento, Javier Iguacel, and the candidate for national senator of the PRO, María Eugenia Talerico, submitted a letter to the Attorney General of the Court of the Province of Buenos Aires. They did this to investigate the actions of the judges who canceled the police trial.
This Thursday the second regular session of the Senate of Buenos Aires in 2023 took place. The scandal affecting the provincial Chamber of Deputies was not mentioned once
