The judge of the Sixth Penal Chamber of the National District has given the husband and son of the former Argentinian ambassador here 65 days to come before the court to answer accusations about their participation in the assassination of 12-year old Jose Rafael Llenas Aybar in May, 1996. Judge Julio Cesar Cano Alfau set for 5 March the case against Juan Manuel Moline Rodriguez, Mario Jose Redondo Llenas, Luis Palmas de la Calzada and Martin Palmas Meccia, husband and son of the former ambassador, Teresa Meccia de Palmas. The Palmas Meccia are fugitives of Dominican justice as they abandoned the country prior to the proceedings. The former diplomats could be judged in their absence, but it is unlikely they will return to the Dominican Republic. Artagnan Pérez and Ambiorix Díaz Estrella represent confessed assassin Mario Redondo Llenas, a cousin of the victim, and Bienvenido Figueroa Mendez is the representative of Moliné Rodríguez, who also confessed his participation. The minor disappeared on 3 May and the next day was found dead, stabbed 34 times, in the Arroyo Lebron lagoon located at Km. 24 of the Autopista Duarte, near a farm property of the former Argentinian diplomats. Lawyer Luis Miguel Pereyra, who represents the family of José Rafael Llenas Aybar in the case, said that there is a plot to focus all the attention on the Argentinians in order to avoid that the courts condemn Mario José Redondo, Juan Moliné and other Dominican suspects. Pereyra told the press it is unlikely the Argentinians would return to the Dominican Republic to face justice, or that they would be affected as they are in Argentina, a nation with which the Dominican Republic does not have an extradition treaty. Pereyra said that by focusing the attention on the Argentinians, defendants of the other persons involved, in conjunction with key persons in the Dominican judiciary, hope to deliberately distract public attention from the Dominican culprits and all who are guilty would then go unpunished. The family said that the Argentinians left the country because of the "lack of responsibility of the authorities which at the time should have requested and obtained the lifting of diplomatic immunity they enjoyed."
