MORE HONDURAN CONGRESSMEN ACCUSED OF CRIMINAL

UNCLAS TEGUCIGALPA 001757 SIPDIS STATE FOR INL/LP, INR/B, AND WHA/CEN E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV KCRM KJUS HO SUBJECT: MORE HONDURAN CONGRESSMEN ACCUSED OF CRIMINAL ACTIVITY ¶1. (U) SUMMARY: The Honduran Public Ministry (PM) announced last week that it has begun legal proceedings against two more Honduran elected officials. On July 10, Attorney General Roy Medina announced that his office will bring charges against alternative National Party (PN) Congressman Melvin Tomas Regalado for aiding the November 2002 escape of a man sentenced to nine years in prison for armed robbery. Similarly, Assistant Attorney General for the Environment, Juan Francisco Gonzalez, said that Liberal Party (PL) alternative Congressman Mauro Caballero was being investigated for destruction of the environment in a protected area. The PM plans to ask the Honduran Supreme Court to lift each officials' immunity in order to prosecute their cases. END SUMMARY -------------- Regalado Accused of Aiding Jail Break -------------- ¶2. (U) The PM announced last week that it is beginning legal proceedings against two more Honduran elected officials. In the case of alternative PN Congressman Melvin Tomas Regalado, Attorney General Roy Medina asked the Supreme Court to set aside the congressman's immunity and issue a warrant for his arrest. Regalado is accused of aiding the escape of Amilcar Antonio Portillo, sentenced to nine years in prison for armed robbery. According to the Public Ministry, Portillo walked away from the Central Penitentiary on November 15, 2002 after Regalado presented a letter to prison officials on National Congress letterhead authorizing his release for the weekend. An ex-director of the Preventative Special Services (the law enforcement branch responsible for the prison system) and the former head of the Central Penitentiary are already being held without bail awaiting trial for their part in the escape. -------------- Caballero Accused of Damaging the Environment -------------- ¶3. (U) On July 10, Assistant Attorney General for the Environment, Juan Francisco Gonzalez, submitted a report to Attorney General Medina recommending that the Public Ministry ask the Supreme Court to lift the immunity of Liberal Party (PL) alternative Congressman Mauro Caballero, and issue him a court summons. Caballero is accused of deforesting an area around a lagoon on his property in Villanueva, Cortes that had been designated as a protected area. Following the announcement, the local press published numerous photographs of the area in question, complete with felled trees, a dried up lagoon bed, and dead turtles. Juan Carlos Caballero, the son of the accused, told local media that it is his family's property and that they could do whatever they wanted with it. ¶4. (SBU) COMMENT: The legal proceedings against Regalado and Caballero indicate that the PM has finally begun to move against high-profile individuals, something that Post has been urging for some time. These positive steps, coupled with increased public pressure stemming from the recent arrests of Central American Parliament Representative Cesar Diaz and National Congress Deputy Armando Avila Panchame on unrelated narcotrafficking charges, will help keep pressure on lawmakers to keep their promise to repeal Honduras,s immunity laws. It also demonstrates some progress on the Maduro Administration's pledge to end impunity and apply the criminal justice code more uniformly. END COMMENT Palmer