The chavismo shuffles its militants in the criminal courts
Those in Venezuela are jurists that have revolving doors. Sooner or later they have been deputies, ministers or representatives of Bolivarian associations. This report presents the conclusions of a work of data journalism that crosses the names of all the country's criminal judges with the lists of the government party, and therefore indicates that 40% of them are of chavista militancy. Among the most prominent in this case are acolytes who condemned political prisoners like Araminta González and even the first lady’s son, Walter Gavidia Flores, who was in charge of a court until 2014.
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Portrayed
wearing a red t-shirt. Joel Dario Altuve Patiño walks confidently at the front
of a crowd that raises the flags of the Bolivarian revolution. There - looking
forward - he can be seen in the center of a cover photo in their social
networks. But he is neither a political nor syndicate leader, let alone a
grassroots militant; he is the judge in charge of the Third Trial Court of the
Metropolitan Area of ??Caracas.
He
is clearly a chavista. Not only it's suggested by his judgments, he’s also given
away by the red cap he usually wears; he even admits it publicly in social
networks. And he is not the only one: at least one in three judges of the
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela appears circumscribed in the lists of militants
of the revolution.
Courtesy Joel Darío Altuve Patiño personal Facebook account
Courtesy: Runrunes
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In
early 2006, the magistrates of the Republic inaugurated the judicial year with
the famous "¡Uh, ah, Chávez no se va!" ("Chávez won't leave!"). Shrouded in the
majesty of the black toga of justice, they rose from their seats in the Plenary
Council of the Supreme Court to chant the chorus that used to summon the
followers of the Bolivarian Revolution's leader. Being present in the
auditorium, which seemed an electoral act, a proud Hugo Chávez thanked the
gesture with a resounding applause.
Venezuelan
magistrates are chavistas. It is not a surprise anymore to notice that the top
of the Supreme Court of Justice is all red, but further down into the hierarchy
a good part of Venezuelan judges also appear directly committed to the
government. Their links are revealed in this investigation after the
cross-reference of five databases that mix the official list of all the
country's criminal judges with four of the records that the political bureau of
the revolution has been filtering since 1999. The conclusion: 40% of the
criminal judges are or at least have been acolytes of the government
party.
Family portrait
Although
the Judicial Power has 1,125 criminal courts throughout the country, it only
confirms the names of 823 judges in charge. From these, 332 appear on at least
one of the lists of militants that the United Socialist Party of Venezuela
compiled in the years 2007, 2012 and 2013 or in an earlier one of the former
Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) headed by former President Hugo
Chávez.
Nineteen
of these judges are even registered and endorsed in all the lists of chavism.
Particularly outstanding in that club is the judge of the Metropolitan Area,
Fanny del Valle Sánchez, who imposed in 2010 a presentation regime every 20 days
against the opposition deputy for the state of Barinas, Wilmer Azuaje, now
recently imprisoned for a political case and at that time sentenced for the
first time by an altercation with a police officer who demanded abuse of
authority, after the parliamentarian became dissident of the
government.
Stands
out also Javier Toro Ibarra, another unconditional, whose name will be riveted
to the case of Araminta González, the young chemist who was sent to prison in
2014 after the Scientific, Criminal and Forensic Investigations Corps declared
to have found explosives at her residence during a raid as result of
incriminating denounces made by "cooperating patriots".
They
are political judges. Their names being among those in the trenches of the PSUV
confirms that in Venezuela justice is not blind. "Even if they have been
coerced into signing up for any party", says the lawyer Laura Louza, who has
been warning in recent years from the non-governmental organization Access to
Justice, about the lack of independence of the judicial system. "If they were
forced to join a party it’s even more serious, because it portrays justice as an
executing branch of the Government".
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Worse than Afghanistan
The
article 26 of the Constitution guarantees "impartial" justice, but it is even
more explicit in the article 256 about the need for judges, prosecutors and
magistrates who are not biased: "(...) from the date of their appointment and
until their egress they may not, except in the exercise of their vote, carry out
partisan, guild, trade-union or similar political activism, or engage in private
lucrative activities incompatible with their function".
Those
in Venezuela are jurists that have revolving doors. For example, the case of
Edgar Daniel Parra Barrios, who served as judge in the Judicial Circuit of the
state of Mérida after presiding the Front of Socialist Lawyers and the
Bolivarian Association of Lawyers. Not to mention the president of the Criminal
Judicial Circuit of the state of Vargas, Jaime de Jesús Velásquez Martínez, who
until 2004 was vice-minister of Legal Security of the Chávez
government.
Not
surprisingly, Venezuela ranks last in the Rule of Law Index published on a
yearly basis by the World Justice Project, to measure the access to justice that
a common citizen finds in the courts of 113 different countries. Even behind
Afghanistan and Cambodia, Bolivarian justice has been at the bottom of the world
for more than five years, according to the results of more than 100,000 surveys
- applied simultaneously in all countries - that precisely measure the
functioning of criminal justice, as well as separation of powers,
anti-corruption efforts, open government and human rights among other
issues.
Without
going too far, more than half of the Venezuelan population values ??their judges
negatively. According to 2015 Living Conditions National Survey, carried out by
the universities Simón Bolívar, Católica Andrés Bello and Central de Venezuela,
56% consider their work as "very bad". At the head of this study, Roberto
Briceño-León, a researcher, points out that even worse is the idea that the
country has about the relationship between judges and crimes: 52% link them
directly while another 32% think they are more or less
related.
Regardless
of perceptions, reality shows these civil servants are vulnerable, subordinated
to a system in which they lack autonomy. From 1,125 criminal courts in the
country, only 273 have permanent judges, according to the data processed for
this work, presented with some inaccuracies by the Supreme Court of Justice
(TSJ). That is, only one in four judges is titular, while the rest are
temporary, accidental, itinerant or substitute and may well be dismissed without
any disciplinary process. "The doorman of a court has more stability than the
presiding judge", summarizes Briceño-León.
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The jurist's profile
If
a profile of the jurist in charge of the criminal courts was to be made, the
data indicate they are attorneys graduated mainly from the Universidad Santa
María in Caracas and whose position was not obtained through a merit-based
selection contest as established by the Constitution in the article 255. They
are sympathetic to chavism and in 40% of cases they have even joined the
government party.
Sometimes
they even exhibit more severity in cases against supporters and leaders of the
Venezuelan opposition. An example of this: Alfredo Baptista Oviedo, of the
Criminal Judicial Circuit of Aragua, who is a member of the PSUV and had more
leniency for his comrades, the Puente Llaguno gunmen, than with a group of young
people who last year participated in a protest against the head of state,
Nicolás Maduro.
In
a joint judgment with two other colleagues, Baptista declared innocent and
released four of the subjects that were recorded on video on April 11, 2002 in
the center of Caracas firing at the concentration calling for Chavez's
resignation. But last year he ordered the arrest of 13 young people who
participated in the march that the Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD) called on
October 26 under the name of the "Takeover of Venezuela".
The
system rewards the chavistas. Judges Maikel Moreno and Marjorie Calderón
arrived at the directive board of the Supreme Court of Justice after forging
their paths - precisely in the criminal courts - with rulings against emblematic
political prisoners such as commissioner Iván Simonovis. The efficient ones are
able to climb positions, but the system also knows how to expel and punish those
who break the mold. This is the case of judge María Lourdes Afiuni, for whom the
United Nations requested in 2010 her immediate release, as well as the
reinstatement of her position as head of the 31st Control Court of Caracas, from
which she was dismissed after issuing precautionary measures against Eligio
Cedeño, another political prisoner.
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The shadow of the Afiuni case
"In
Venezuela, judges do not decide, but rather satisfy the whims of the
government", declared Afiuni on June 30, 2015 in one of the same courtrooms of
the Palace of Justice of Caracas where, years before, she stood out on the
podium. "In six years they destroyed my life, my daughter's and my
family's".
On
that day, Afiuni broke the silence on a series of tortures and vexations she had
kept in reserve. She told that she received a kick with a National Guard's boot
which caused a distortion in one of her breasts. That she was forced to share
the pavilion with inmates who had previously been convicted in her office and
receive beatings and harassment from them. That in several opportunities they
sprayed her cell with gasoline. That she was victim of several beatings and that
nobody, at all, did anything to avoid it.
"I
want you to know one thing: they emptied my uterus", she said looking at one of
the many judges who knew the case. Another of them, ironies of life, was Alí
Paredes, the next that went to prison after the Judicial Commission pointed at
him for favoring the Venezuelan drug trafficker, Walid Makled, and his
brothers.
Paredes
was more lenient with the Makled brothers than with Afiuni, to whom not only
denied precautionary measures in substitution of imprisonment but also medical
treatment. The defense of the judge attributed this behavior only to links
between the jurist and the government, which are now evident looking in the
records of PSUV militants. "I would never betray this process, much less my
commander, because I carry the revolution in my blood (...) for the revolution I
would give my life as I risked it on April 11 in Puente Llaguno", he posted in
2009 on the website of the government party itself.
Even
with a license, the revolution eats its own children. Paredes is an example of
the 332 cases of judges declared chavistas that this investigation expose and
who swarm the courts corridors.
There,
however, in the twists and turns of the judicial system, there are no answers on
this subject: as if it were a novel by Franz Kafka, it was not possible for a
representative of the Supreme Court to explain how the Venezuelan judges are all
red. Much less in the Executive Direction of the Magistracy where, in the
absence of answers, in the institution's Department of Security they took the
data of the author of the note and confiscated his ID card during an
interrogation that demanded the motivations of its
questions.
Instead
of explaining the devices they use to select the judges responsible for settling
killings and kidnappings in one of the hemisphere's most violent countries, on
the afternoon of July 6, it seemed suspicious that someone was investigating the
matter. "You're gringo",
was their
conclusion.
