Ex-Supreme Court justice says Venezuela manipulates courts

[Bacchus4.0]

http://news.yahoo.com/ex-supreme-court-justice-says-venezuela-manipulates-courts-211142269.html

not really news, I know.


....MIAMI (Reuters) - A Venezuelan Supreme Court judge who was removed from his post last month for assisting a drug trafficker has accused President Hugo Chavez's leftist government of systematically manipulating the courts, including meddling in drug cases.

Eladio Aponte fled two weeks ago to Costa Rica, where he contacted officials of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and was flown to the United States, a Costa Rican official told Reuters.

"It's very corrupt at every single level. There's a lot of manipulation," Aponte said in an interview taped in Costa Rica by Miami-based online TV channel Soi TV and broadcast on Wednesday in Venezuela by an opposition television station.

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He said top government officials regularly met judges and prosecutors in the vice president's office to discuss what action to take in legal cases that were important to the government. "That's where the directives of the justice system come from," he said.

[RobertEarl]

1. Oh

They learned a lot from the bush/cheney era did they?

"It's very corrupt at every single level. There's a lot of manipulation,"

[ocpagu]

2. A judge who was removed from his post for assisting a drug trafficker?

Yep. Seems to be quite a qualified opinion.

[Bacchus4.0]

3. well, we see posts on claims from jailed Colombian paramilitaries here too

Members can decide for themselves if this guy has credibility.

[joshcryer]

5. He does have crediblity as a vile human being. Consider the manipulation charge.

He doesn't actually express remorse over it, it's more that he's sad they made a mockery of him for simply following orders.

It's like some gang member not being sad that they robbed a bunch of people, but being sad the gang kicked them out.

He seems to me to be a die hard chavista who just wants forgiveness.

That's what's telling about the entire thing.

[joshcryer]

4. What made him qualified to be a supreme court judge in the first place?

He feels slighted more than anything:

He basically is arguing to return to the chavista fold and be accepted again despite his misdeeds since "everyone else was doing it."

One day hopefully he will get justice.

And by that I mean arrested, and jailed.

[ChangoLoa]

6. You mean the superstar judge who was personally condecorated by Chavez

after he helped to send dissidents and former Chavez's allies to prison. He was named head of the Penal Room in the Venezuelan Supreme Court by the president himself.

Note that he was a lieutenant-colonel in the army when Chavez reached power.