As the Operation Anti-Octopus continues, the Public Prosecutor’s Office on Wednesday, 1 September 2021 reports more than 20 raids in different places in the National District, and the provinces of Santo Domingo and Monseñor Nouel. The raids are tied to investigations related to corruption and money laundering schemes involving Alexis Medina Sánchez. Medina Sánchez is a major government contractor who is also the brother of former President Danilo Medina Sánchez.
Prosecutors carried out the operations from the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office for the Prosecution of Administrative Corruption (Pepca), led by Deputy Prosecutor Wilson Camacho, and the General Prosecution Office of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, headed by Deputy Prosecutor Yeni Berenice Reynoso.
The Attorney General Office has described Operation Anti-Pulpo as a corporate network that used influence peddling to establish contractual relations with state institutions, through which billions of pesos were irregularly obtained. The investigations have revealed that many of these companies had neither the capital nor the personnel to offer the services for which they were contracted.
Regarding the ongoing judicial process, the Public Prosecutor’s Office requested an extension of four months to to present the accusations to the Third Court of Instruction of the National District. The prosecutors said they need more time to include new findings and wait for a report from the Chamber of Accounts.
In the Operation Anti-Octopus, in addition to Alexis Medina Sánchez, the justice system has also ordered preventive detention since last December on Fernando Rosa, former director of the Patrimonial Fund of the Reformed Enterprises (Fonper); Francisco Pagán Rodríguez and Aquiles Alejandro Christopher, former general director and former director of Fiscalization of the Oisoe, respectively; Wacal Vernavel Méndez Pineda, treasurer of the companies created by Medina Sánchez; also Julián Esteban Suriel Suazo and José Dolores Santana Carmona, accused of being Medina Sánchez’s frontmen.
In the case, Lorenzo Wilfredo (Freddy) Hidalgo Núñez, former minister of Public Health, is under house arrest, while Carmen Magalys Medina Sánchez, sister of Alexis Medina Sánchez and former administrative vice-president of Fonper, is in domiciliary arrest with an electronic locator.
Former Comptroller General Rafael Antonio Germosén remains under house arrest, while Domingo Antonio Santiago, another of those accused of being a frontman for the ringleader of the network, must comply with a periodic presentation before the prosecuting bodies of the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
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Attorney General
Hoy
Listin Diario
3 September 2021