In a fulminating action, akin to his promise not to allow the image of his government and the country’s honor to be ruined by indecent practices, President Luis Abinader suspended Juan Maldonado Castro, director of Digna Comunidad, from office yesterday. for implications in illicit activities, thus becoming the ninth civil servant suspended and / or dismissed from office.
“I promised this country that there was going to be no impunity. I promised this country that I was going to see a Public Ministry that was going to act, whoever falls, and that is what is being exercised in this country.” say the head of state.
“In this country there are no more sacred cows. In this country everything that makes it pay. Justice will already be in charge of determining,” he added.
In this regard, he said he would now wait for the National Directorate of Drug Control (DNCD) and the Attorney General’s Office to give the details, in full, of this entire operation.
Luis Abinader answered questions from journalists about the case in which Juan Maldonado Castro was captured, for his alleged involvement in issues related to drug trafficking and money laundering. Minutes before his statements, Abinader had temporarily suspended Maldonado Castro, by decree 550-21. “What yes, this is a sacred commitment that I have with our country, to end what many decades, both in administrative corruption and in organized crime that existed, which was impunity and protection. This is no longer it exists in the Dominican Republic, “he said.
Former Youth Minister Kinberly Taveras staged the first scandal over alleged irregularities in the management of public funds while she was director of the Guayiga Municipal District.
Operation Falcon
Yesterday morning, Wednesday, it kicked off with 60 prosecutors to certify 80 home violations in various jurisdictions, including the National District, and more than 200 anti-narcotics agents in defense of its operations.
The Attorney General’s Office revealed new names that make up the alleged drug trafficking and money laundering network known as Operation Falcon. Among those arrested are Rafael Albert de Jesús, Marisol López Ceballo (Mary); Elva Teresa Polanco, Víctor Elpidio Paulino Herrera, Francisco Linares Pimentel, Adolfo Torres Sanabia, Juli Cèsar Jiménez Talavera and José Alejandro de la Cruz Morales. In addition to the above, Juan José de la Cruz Morales, also known as Wandy, Wander, W, El Michero, L’Home or El Do, also, Juan Maldonado Castro (Martial or El Líder), Maria Olimpia Tavares Rodríguez (Oil , the Princess); Lenin Bladimir Torres Bueno and Delfina Assumpció Polanco.
According to the Public Ministry, the members of the network acquired, as a product of drug trafficking, hundreds of properties, weapons of war, fuel stations, luxury real estate, farms, high-end vehicles, parts, boats, dealers , nightclubs, gambling banks and entertainment companies.
Also, they funded political campaigns by directly supporting legislators.
The MP said that this network operated in the northern part of the country, especially in Santiago, but with branches in the eastern region of the country and that those involved were engaged in money laundering as a result and illicit profit to mobilize large shipments of drugs from South America, especially from Colombia and Venezuela, to the Dominican Republic, in order to take them to the United States, Puerto Rico and Europe, using speedboats, sports boats (double bottom), fishing boats and containers “.
The MP notes that the network is linked to a 1,786-kilogram item occupied by Puerto Rican authorities in November 2016, as well as another 500-kilogram item of cocaine introduced in Puerto Rico in December 2018, and a another of 722 packages occupied by the DNCD in Boca de Yuma in November 2018, plus one of 659 packages of cocaine occupied in Bayahíbe in November 2018.
In February 2019, 254 packages of cocaine were seized from individuals linked to the network on the road section of the Coral Motorway, between the Coral II toll station and the Verón-Punta Cana municipal district roundabout. . The arrested are linked to the drug trafficking network in which in March 2019 1,050 packages of cocaine were seized, to the Go Fast type boat that was adrift due to lack of fuel about 50 nautical miles north of Puerto Rico.
Also, they relate to two other items, 86 and 139 packets of cocaine, occupied by the DNCD in May 2019.
“Certainly, the Public Ministry, in coordination with the National Directorate of Drug Control, as well as with the support of the DEA, has had several months in a rather complex investigation that includes about nine provinces in the country in which we have had to move to commit approximately 86 violations on a preliminary basis, ”specified Yeni Berenice Reynoso.
He added that they have occupied a lot of evidence, including “exorbitant” amounts in dollars that he has not wanted to specify at the moment because home violations are underway.
He described the operation as one of the most important in the country against money laundering. Reynoso explained that the investigation involves the arrest of extraditable persons and that other defendants will be prosecuted by the Santiago Prosecutor’s Office.
JUAN MALDONADO
A Santiago.
The Attorney General’s Office, the National Directorate of Drug Control (DNCD) and other state security agencies yesterday committed more than 20 home violations in commercial establishments, apartment towers, premises, financial and other places of Santiago, where several people were captured and several goods were seized.