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#131337
Former Nicaraguan President Arnoldo Alemán is taken to prison after a chaotic raid at his ranch, where he was serving house arrest for corruption.

BY TIFANI ROBERTS

Special to the Herald


MANAGUA - Police in riot gear stormed the ranch of former Nicaraguan President Arnoldo Alemán, hauling him out of house arrest to serve his corruption sentence with violent criminals in the country's largest prison.

Saying he suffers high blood pressure, Alemán refused to turn himself in when Judge Juana Méndez -- clad in a bullet proof vest -- showed up at his house to deliver the transfer orders Friday night. It took about two dozen special-forces officers 5 ½ hours to get past the ex-president's wife, former Miami schoolteacher María Fernanda de Alemán, his adult daughters and other relatives using themselves as shields.

''They want to kill my husband!'' a sobbing María Fernanda told the chaotic throngs of police, politicians, farm workers and reporters. ``He's in no condition to go to jail!''

LOCKED IN BEDROOM

After an hourlong screaming and shoving session, police forced open Alemán's bedroom door, where he was locked in with his maid, doctor and 4-week-old baby. He emerged in his trademark Liberal Party red shirt, smiling and waving his arms as in triumph. About midnight, he was whisked away in a luxury Land Cruiser to the Tipitapa prison north of Managua.

Alemán, president from 1997 to 2002, was convicted in December of fraud, embezzlement and money laundering for diverting nearly $100 million in public funds from the hemisphere's second-poorest nation. He was sentenced to 20 years and fined $10 million.

But acting on a court-ordered medical review that said Alemán was too sick to serve hard time, Judge Méndez initially ruled that the former president could serve the sentence at his ranch. Méndez reconsidered last week.

But the transfer out of house arrest was widely seen as a symbol of how deeply politicized Nicaragua's courts -- and the country's biggest criminal case -- have become. The crusade to keep Alemán out of dirty prison cells has become a negotiating tool between the Sandinista Party, which controls the courts, and Alemán's Liberal Party, which controls Congress.

Observers say the two sides no longer bother pretending that political parties are not meddling in the case.

`POLITICAL GAME'

''At some moment, they tried to keep up appearances, but now the gloves have come off,'' said Roberto Courtney, president of Ethics and Transparency, a Managua government watchdog group. ``Now, from punches we've gone to biting and hair-pulling, obviously a more embarrassing spectacle.''

Alemán's transfer order came after a week of contradicting appellate court orders. The criminal division of the appeals court rejected Alemán's claims of health problems and ordered him taken to jail, but the civil division issued an injunction to block the transfer.

''Both courts are arm-wrestling each other,'' Interior Minister Julio Vega said. ``They are two players in the political game.''

The move to force Alemán into prison was believed to be a political ploy by former President Daniel Ortega, who heads the Sandinista party and is considered to wield considerable control over the criminal courts. As Méndez is, most criminal court judges in Nicaragua are Sandinistas.

''People have always wanted to portray this case as a political one,'' Méndez said Friday night. ``But the sentence I have with me is a legitimate one.''

Minutes after Alemán reached his cell, hundreds of supporters took to the streets in protest, burning tires and breaking bottles. Several arrests, but no injuries, were reported.


http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/8239076.htm

This is excellent news. I was just in Nicaragua, and for most people I talked to it was a massive insult and evidence of the corruption of the government that Aleman was not in jail, but was allowed to stay in his luxurious ranch and have visitors as he pleased. I do disagree with how political this article makes it sounds, the guy stole $100 million dollars, he should be in jail. The only reason he isn't is because of the considerable influence he still wields in the government and among organized crime.
By bach
#131732
the guy stole $100 million dollars
:lol:

Thats just pocket cash, which he deposited in a Miami Bank, who knows how much state property and funds he stole as well, anyway if it was for the 100 million dollards almost all presidents in central and south america would be jailed, that excluding Castro who has to put his money in Zurich, because he cant deposit it in Miami.
By Steven_K
#131918
True enough, but he got caught, and convicted. Send him to solitary confinment, to show that government corruption will not be tolerated.
User avatar
By Baron Nogood
#133505
:: Supresses a smirk ::

In a region where presidents are universally impeached after they have served their time, corruption has always been tolerated...not by the population of course, but the entire stucture of all Latin American countries political and judicial are utterly corrupt.

There is an organisation which measure corruption (Watch this space), and I know that Latin American countries rank among the finest!!

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