Of the 830 inmates freed by the government on occasion of the Christmas holidays, one case that stands apart is that of PRSC political leader Stalin Lebron, who in January 2003 was handed a 10-year jail sentence for the murder of his fellow PRSC politico Vinicio Zaldivar during a heated discussion at a PRSC convention in February 2002. Although Lebron did not meet the requirements needed for the pardon, he was freed 11 months after being sentenced because Item 27 of Article 55 of the Constitution grants the President of the Republic the right to pardon prisoners on the dates of 27 February, 16 August and 23 December of every year. Part of Lebron’s sentence also included a fine of RD$3 million. The same case indicates that Lebron had been imprisoned previously for such charges as robbery, forging of documents and use of fake documents. Subsequently, an Appeals Court reduced the sentence to four years.
Hoy newspaper last week carried the complaint of journalist Rafael Tomas Jaime, who cited the case of Adalberto Santana. With only three months time served of his seven-year jail term in connection to the death of the journalist’s brother Santo Tomas Santos Jaime, Santana’s name appeared on the list of those to be released. Jaime says that, on top of the current sentence, which also carried a fine of RD$3 million, Santana also has a case in the judiciary pending against him for robbery and armed assault. After the family made the complaint, Santana’s name was stricken from the list and he was not released.
Hoy newspaper reports that by contrast Fray Aristides Jimenez Richardson, the Catholic Church coordinator who works with the jails, implored the government to pardon Bolivar Morillo de la Cruz, the man condemned to one year in prison but who has been in jail for two years in La Victoria because he does not have the money to pay a RD$3,000 fine. The priest said that the inmate already has served his time. Jimenez Richardson denied that the church had any delegate on the commission that granted the pardons and criticized the arbitrary and trivial way in which the pardons had been granted.
Diario Libre reports that the commission is composed of Attorney General Victor Cespedes; Attorney of the Court of Appeals Rafael Mejia Guerrero; deputy director of Prisons Arelis Peguero; director of Prisons Juan Caceres Urena; Domingo Porfirio Rojas Nina, member of the jail board, and Virgilio Almanzar, president of the Dominican Committee of Human Rights. Almanzar reportedly abstained from voting on Lebron’s pardon because Lebron was one of the founders of an organization he heads. Only Rojas Nina voted against the pardon.
In an interview with El Caribe, Victor Cespedes said that Lebron did fulfill the requirement of at least half the term in jail when taking into account that his sentence for murder had been reduced to four years and he had almost two years in prison.