Over the past few months, 98 policemen have been accused of violating Law 24-97 that deals with violence within the family, particularly wife beating. Yesterday the National Police requested that the prosecutor for the National District act with due haste in the punishment of those accused of family violence. According to police statistics, at least 98 officers have been accused of beating their wives, and this does not include threats of violence that might well take place within a home.
Major general Daysi Liriano and Colonel Jose Francisco Garcia Lara talked to reporters yesterday, after meeting with Santo Domingo District Attorney Jose Manuel Hernandez Peguero at the internal affairs office of the police department. During the meeting, General Liriano told the district attorney that Police chief Bernardo Santana Paez wanted to see that the penalties for violation of Law 24-97 were levied more effectively.
Colonel Garcia Lara, the legal advisor for the police, told reporters that the new Penal Code provided for cases dealing with family violence to be heard under the ordinary justice system, rather than in special police courts. The legal counsel for the National Police reminded the officers that they had the same rights as an ordinary citizen to hire counsel, seek bail or apply for a writ of habeas corpus.
In his comments to the press, Hernandez Peguero greeted the police initiative and said that his assistants would certainly take note to be sure that the cases related to policemen were duly processed in the courts.