Government corruption charges in the Dominican Republic will be aired in a Miami, Florida court. The case was opened after senator for the province of San Juan de la Maguana, Felix Bautista, a close aide of former President Leonel Fernandez, sued economist Jaime Aristy Escuder, lawyer Jose Alejandro Ayuso and novelist Andres Mateo for US$25 million for publishing a book on a Sunland financial intermediary case in the Dominican Republic. The case hit the headlines in the Dominican Republic after the opposition PRD party alerted that the loan did not receive Congressional approval.
The book, “The Dark Side of Sun Land” (in Spanish) was launched and put on sale in Miami. The DR courts ruled that there were not sufficient grounds to hear the case locally, but after Bautista sued for defamation, the case will now be heard in the Miami court. Bautista will have to prove that the findings presented in the book are false in order to win the libel case. Aristy, Ayuso and Mateo have created a Committee of Popular Support to Fight Corruption to help finance their counsel in Florida.
As reported in El Dia, Bautista said he decided to sue the writers because his son, who studies engineering in Michigan, said he didn’t want to return to the country to exercise his profession because he had the same name as his father. Bautista made the statement during a hearing in the ruling PLD party majority Congress on how he acquired his extensive assets. He says the book establishes that the works built in the state university UASD as per Sun Land contract were overvalued by US$112 million, and he says he can prove this is not so.
The defendants say that the case is important for the country because it is a fight for transparency in government.
www.acento.com.do/index.php/news/125980/71/Andres-L-Mateo-Esto-de-alguna-forma-es-un-simbolo-de-la-lucha-contra-la-corrupcion-en-el-pais
www.acento.com.do/index.php/news/125985/56/Mateo-Escuder-y-Ayuso-daran-la-batalla-ante-demanda-de-Felix-Bautista.html
http://www.diariolibre.com/movil/noticias_det.php?id=404610
http://www.diariolibre.com/noticias/2013/10/08/i405548_felix-bautista-advierte-que-defendera-donde-sea.html