Will Venezuela erase a murder conviction in the Antonini case?

Will Venezuela erase a murder conviction in the Antonini case?
3 January 2008

Corrupt officials within the Venezuelan government, intent on damage control in the Antonini money laundering scandal, are reportedly in the process of placing a large bribe with a senior appellate judge, to illegally erase the murder conviction of Walter Alexander del Nogal, the reputed supervisor of Antonini's multiple money laundering operations in Argentina.

Del Nogal, who is a senior advisor to DISIP, is presently in custody in Italy, arrested under an order of the Anti-Mafia Magistrate, pursuant to allegations that he was engaged in narcotics trafficking, including the sale of cocaine, with the Sicilian Mafia.

He is also a fugitive from justice in Switzerland, having escaped whilst serving a sentence for drug trafficking and money laundering, several years ago.

Do they really think an illegal act by a court will rehabilitate this career criminal in the eyes of the public?

This week's developments demonstrate that desperate measures are being undertaken by corrupt officials to divert the public's attention from the issues of endemic governmental corruption that were revealed in the Antonini scandal.

The government's obvious attempt to use the publicity surrounding the efforts to secure the release of three hostages held by the FARC having failed, it is now looking to abuse the judicial system: Military sources in Venezuela have reported that an illegal payment will be offered to Judge Alfonso Dugarte, of the Court of Appeal, to set aside the convictions of del Nogal [UID 441491] and co-defendant Ramiro Helmeyer Quevedo [UID 441490], who were found guilty of killing Mario Patty Fajardo, by throwing him out of an aircraft flying over the Caribbean in 1995.

President Chavez issued a pardon for both defendants. Helmeyer, also a DISIP advisor, is a fugitive from justice in the United States, having fled a federal firearms charge; he was later indicted on the charge of Escape in US District Court in Georgia.

* Helmeyer is also reported to have been the terrorist who disrupted the Caracas financial district in 1993 with six bomb attacks, having received the explosives from dissident Venezuelan Military officers linked to Hugo Chavez Frias.

The grounds alleged to vacate the conviction are that the deceased is not only still alive, but a fugitive from justice in Valencia where he as been charged with auto theft. The proponents of this scheme have stated that Patty has been seen alive, and court documents have reportedly been forged, with sufficient supporting facts created, to falsely document the bogus criminal charges.

The fact that Patty has not been seen since he was seen falling into the Caribbean thirteen years ago does not seem to have bothered the plotters, who allegedly include the highest-ranking official in the Ministry of the Interior, which supervises the judiciary, who is reportedly instructing the ranking judge of the Circuit Court, Magistrate Eladio Ramon Aponte Aponte [UID 318820], on this matter.

Should this bogus legal maneuver be successfully completed during the coming week, then the man whom most experts believe orchestrated a complex money laundering scheme in Argentina last year will be free of his homicide conviction.

Is this a case of governmental corruption stepping in to pervert the criminal justice system in furtherance of a money laundering cover-up?

You decide, but as for me, I wonder if all this trouble is to convince an imprisoned Walter del Nogal that he is better off not cooperating with the authorities in Italy, for he probably could bring down a government if he talked.

* United States vs. Helmeyer, Case Nos. 82-cr-00220, 00355 (N.D. Ga.)

http://www.world-check.com/articles/2008/01/03/wil-venezuela-erase-murder-conviction-antonini-cas/