The executive director of the Foundation for Institutionality and Justice (FINJUS), lawyer Servio Tulio Castanos asked the Justice Department to indict and try all of those people implicated in the failure of Baninter and Banco Mercantil in 2003. Castanos wants not only the banking officers but also those officials of the government that should have been supervising the banks’ activities. The collapse of the bank eventually snowballed and has cost the Dominican government and its people US$3 billion dollars. Castanos wants to see the executives at the court as well as those officials charged with supervision of the banks and whose negligence or complicity led to the financial crisis that shook the country. He added that these authorities should also answer for the disastrous liquidation process that surrounded the assets of the banks, which not only violated the Monetary and Financial Code but also different articles of the Dominican Penal Code. He called the case the “most important case before the courts at this time,” and requested drastic sanctions for those found guilty.