Ecuador’s Public Prosecutor’s Office requests pre-trial detention of former president Moreno

Ecuador’s prosecutor general, Wilson Toainga, has requested this Wednesday the preventive imprisonment for former Ecuadorian president Lenín Moreno, as well as for his wife, Rocío González, and eight more defendants in the ‘Ina Papers’ case.

The request for preventive imprisonment comes after ten of the 37 accused in the case – which includes alleged bribery crimes and whose economic perjury amounts to US$76 million – did not show up at the police station periodically, as the judge investigating the case ordered after charging them with bribery.

Moreno and González are in Paraguay, where they currently reside.

In March, a judge in Ecuador rejected their request to report periodically to the Ecuadorian Embassy in Asunción, the Paraguayan capital, instead of to a police station in Quito.

When it was rejected, both were to report to the Ecuadorian police station every 15 days, which they did not do.

Now, the judge in charge of the case must decide whether to accept the request of the prosecutor, who, in addition to the preventive imprisonment for the ten accused, has requested the issuance of an Interpol search and arrest warrant for those who are abroad.

The ‘Ina Papers’ case broke out in 2019 when alleged irregularities became known related to offshore companies and people from the close environment of Moreno, then president of the country and who at that time already denied his involvement in the alleged corruption scheme.

With information from LGI

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