PGR drops prosecution
The Procuraduría General de la República picked the day after Christmas to announce that it had no evidence to substantiate the charges of money laundering against three prominent rightwing Roman Catholics. The most important of those to be exonerated is the cardinal of Guadalajara, Juan Sandoval Iñiguez.
The cardinal's fellow suspects were a lawyer, José Antonio Ortega, and a businessman, José María Guardia. The investigation started after accusations were levelled against the three by the former attorney-general Jorge Carpizo McGregor. Carpizo and Sandoval have a long-running dispute about the murder of Sandoval's predecessor, Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo. Sandoval alleges that there was a cover-up in the investigation of Posadas Ocampo's murder in 1993. Carpizo said that this is nonsense. The official finding is that the cardinal was killed, accidentally, in a shoot-out between two drug gangs at Guadalajara airport.
Carpizo said that the investigation into his accusations that cardinal Sandoval was involved in money laundering had not been thorough. He said that the reasons why the investigation had been ended were not clear.
Sandoval had been pulling strings - including lobbying the president, Vicente Fox, at a birthday lunch for the president's deeply pious mother - to get the investigation halted.
Sandoval said that he would not sue Carpizo for damages, even though his reputation had been tarnished. He is curious, however, about Carpizo's motives. The cardinal gave a press conference on 7 January in which he wondered whom Carpizo was protecting and why, by refusing to admit that the investigation into the death of cardinal Posadas Ocampo had been cursory. Sandoval claimed that what matters is not the end of the investigation into whether he was involved in money laundering, but a proper investigation into the murder of Posadas Ocampo.
The cardinal's fellow suspects were a lawyer, José Antonio Ortega, and a businessman, José María Guardia. The investigation started after accusations were levelled against the three by the former attorney-general Jorge Carpizo McGregor. Carpizo and Sandoval have a long-running dispute about the murder of Sandoval's predecessor, Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo. Sandoval alleges that there was a cover-up in the investigation of Posadas Ocampo's murder in 1993. Carpizo said that this is nonsense. The official finding is that the cardinal was killed, accidentally, in a shoot-out between two drug gangs at Guadalajara airport.
Carpizo said that the investigation into his accusations that cardinal Sandoval was involved in money laundering had not been thorough. He said that the reasons why the investigation had been ended were not clear.
Sandoval had been pulling strings - including lobbying the president, Vicente Fox, at a birthday lunch for the president's deeply pious mother - to get the investigation halted.
Sandoval said that he would not sue Carpizo for damages, even though his reputation had been tarnished. He is curious, however, about Carpizo's motives. The cardinal gave a press conference on 7 January in which he wondered whom Carpizo was protecting and why, by refusing to admit that the investigation into the death of cardinal Posadas Ocampo had been cursory. Sandoval claimed that what matters is not the end of the investigation into whether he was involved in money laundering, but a proper investigation into the murder of Posadas Ocampo.