“The director of the Police should be questioned for deaths in the detachments,” Joseph Abreu, coordinator of the civic society group, Participación Ciudadana said during an interview with journalists of El Caribe newspaper and CDN media on Tuesday, 17 May 2022. He was accompanied by PC’s Sonia Díaz, board member and Fátima Lorenzo, executive director. They were interviewed by Nelson Rodríguez, director of El Caribe; the director of CDN, Alba Nelly Familia, and CDN news analysts, Julissa Céspedes and Katherine Hernández.
The director of the National Police, Major General Eduardo Alberto Then had been invited last week to the Chamber of Deputies to explain recent deaths of persons in custody of the Police. Instead, he was represented by the Interior and Police Minister Jesus Vasquez and the Police Commissioner Jose de Vila.
On Tuesday, 17 May 2022, the absence of three ruling Modern Revolutionary Party (PRM) deputies, impeded the resolution presented by Jose Horacio Rodriguez of Alianza Pais that requested a new interpellation of the Police director to pass on the floor of the Chamber of Deputies.
The directors of Participación Ciudadana say the deaths at the detachments fall under Major General Then’s responsibility. They call for a regime of internal consequences in the institution to avoid these excesses and to punish the agents involved in an exemplary manner when they occur.
Abreu pointed out that in most cases when these aggressions occur, the response is the transfer of agents. He said there will not be drastic sanctions for this type of misconduct if there is no social pressure. The director of the civic movement pointed out the need for resources to improve salaries and for more resources for police training.
“These are elements that are very basic, because understanding that you cannot allow a prisoner to assault another prisoner is a matter of common sense that should be an element that is taught in the training process and that clear limits are established,” Abreu argued.
Sonia Diaz, a member of the board of directors and former coordinator of the institution, pointed out that the deaths of persons under Police custody are more serious than the deaths by exchanges of gunfire.
“We understand that he (the Police chief) should go and answer the questions because these three crimes, of these three young people, in different geographical locations, in Santo Domingo, Santiago and Ocoa, as the attorney general has said, may well respond to a pattern of behavior. It cannot be at random that in three weeks, in three different detachments the same or similar thing happens. This cannot be at random; the director of the Police should be questioned and he should answer,” said Diaz.
She considered that the reform of the Police has been dealt with for decades and that there are no gains, especially because the same budget is still being used.
“It is not only the budget, but also the human resources. I believe that the Police issue will be resolved when a new parallel body is created, because the current Police is a necessary evil. You cannot eliminate the Police because the whole country would be left without Police, therefore, there has to be a new Police, as for example with the Amet,” said Diaz.
Fatima Lorenzo, executive director of the entity, said that most of the measures announced by the government are financially-related. “In the Police, the patrols need to have internet and that they can connect and ask for people’s identification cards,” urged.
Josehp Abreu added his voice to the criticism of the judicial system’s tendency to impose preventive custody against defendants. In his opinion, the judges should not so easily apply this measure even when requested by the prosecutors. He explained that preventive custody entails the restriction of the accused to defend the process in freedom. He said the judges apply the measure in all cases at all levels and this is resulting in a saturation of the penitentiary system, with overcrowded prisons, mostly with preventive prisoners for crimes that probably could have been handled with another type of coercive measure. He added: “There is a legal principle that says that when the fight for justice is done at the cost of the presumption of innocence, the war is lost in that sense”.
Regarding the judicial actions against those accused of corruption, he said that part of the commitments assumed is to guarantee the resources that the Public Prosecutor’s Office needs to quickly process the corruption cases that are being presented. “Everything is seen as paused, as if it is not advancing. The Public Ministry argues it has a limitation of economic resources and personnel,” he said.
Constitutional reform
The general coordinator of Citizen Participation says PC’s support to the constitutional reform is limited to the proposal of giving greater independence to the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
Abreu explained that to achieve the independence of the Public Ministry, several elements are required and that one of them is that the election of the Attorney General should not depend on the Executive Branch and especially the possibility of removal of whoever holds the position. He considered that the attorney general should be elected by the National Council of the Magistracy as is the case with the Supreme Court, the Constitutional Court and the Superior Electoral Court. At present, the attorney general is named by the President, as per constitutional mandate. Abreu favors then the removal of the attorney general as a voting member of the National Council of the Magistracy.
Abreu explained that it remains to be defined what will happen with half of the prosecutors that the President of the Republic has the power to select.
“If I remove the attorney general from the election of the Executive Branch, what happens with 50% of the deputy prosecutors? Would they become part of the form of election or would they pass under the power of the prosecutor or would they remain under the power of the President?” he wondered. He said that this is an issue that should be defined in the discussions that are taking place in the Economic and Social Council (CES).
“Independence does not come tied to the designation; it is a set of things that is configured. It will also depend on the person, on the profile that is established, that he/she does not have a known political militancy. It will also depend on the regime of consequences, on the obstruction of justice that the attorney general must act and does not act. These are a set of elements that we think that combined in the end can guarantee a greater independence of the person,” stressed the PC executive.
The PC spokespeople said the reform of the Constitution can be carried out but this requires enough time. He said PC has given priority to study constitutional reform, but also to amending the laws of the electoral regime that in the past process showed major weaknesses that had to be corrected by the Constitutional Court.
The general coordinator of Citizen Participation said the government had used the pretext of the pandemic to not apply transparency measures but that this “argument has already run out”.
“We see willingness, but also delays in its effective application; the government has had the excuse of the pandemic, but it is already exhausted,” said Abreu.
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El Caribe
18 May 2022