Thu, August 4, 2022
By Ivelisse Rivera and Kylie Madry
SAN JUAN (Reuters) - U.S. authorities on Thursday announced criminal charges against former Puerto Rico Governor Wanda Vazquez, who was in office from 2019 to 2021, for alleged corruption during her 2020 election campaign.
The former governor is charged with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and honest services wire fraud, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said in a statement.
Vazquez told reporters she was innocent following her initial hearing on Thursday afternoon.
"I have not committed any crime," she said. "They have committed a great injustice by filing these charges."
According to authorities, a Venezuelan-Italian bank owner and a former FBI agent paid some $300,000 to political consultants supporting Vazquez's campaign in exchange for political favors.
Authorities allege that the owner of the bank Bancredito, which was under investigation by the island's regulatory authority, indirectly asked Vazquez to replace the regulator's head with a hand-picked leader to head off the audit.
Bancredito's owner, Julio Martin Herrera Velutini, allegedly coordinated with one of Vazquez's campaign workers, former FBI agent Mark Rossini, to carry out the bribe. Both have been charged alongside Vazquez.
Investigators say that after Vazquez's primary election loss in 2020, Herrera then attempted to bribe her successor, named in the indictment only as "Public Official A."
Puerto Rico's current governor, Pedro Pierluisi, is not under investigation, authorities said.
Herrera's attempts to bribe the current governor to end the audit of Bancredito were unsuccessful, authorities say, as his contact allegedly representing the governor was actually acting on behalf of the FBI.
Two others pleaded guilty for their involvement in the scheme in March. Frances Diaz, former president and chief executive officer of Bancredito, conspired with Herrera and others to bribe the current governor, officials say.
Meanwhile, another of Vazquez's campaign coordinators, John Blakeman, conspired with Herrera and Rossini to bribe Vazquez and with Herrera to bribe her successor, according to the Department of Justice.
The two face up to five years in prison, though their sentencing hearings have not yet been scheduled.
Vazquez, as well as Herrara and Rossini, could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted, U.S. Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico Stephen Muldrow said.
In Vazquez's first appearance in court, U.S. Magistrate Judge for the District of Puerto Rico Camille Velez-Rive ruled the former governor could be released on $50,000 bail on the condition she hand over her passport.
(Reporting by Ivelisse Rivera and Kylie Madry; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
Ex Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez charged with bribery
Governor Wanda Vazquez gives a press conference to announce the extension of the COVID-19 curfew, while detailing the new sectors of the country that may resume operations, as part of a new executive order in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Thursday, May 21, 2020. According to an official who was not authorized to talk about the federal case, Vazquez was arrested on Aug. 3, 2022 in the U.S. territory on federal corruption charges. (AP Photo/Carlos Giusti, file)More
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Thu, August 4, 2022
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Former Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez was arrested Thursday on bribery charges linked to the financing of her 2020 campaign, the latest hit to an island with a long history of corruption that brought fresh political upheaval to the U.S. territory.
Vázquez is accused of engaging in a bribery scheme from December 2019 through June 2020 — while she was governor — with several people, including a Venezuelan-Italian bank owner, a former FBI agent, a bank president and a political consultant.
“I am innocent. I have not committed any crime,” she told reporters. ”I assure you that they have committed a great injustice against me.”
The arrest embarrassed and angered many in Puerto Rico who believe the island's already shaky image has been further tarnished, leaving a growing number of people who have lost faith in their local officials to wonder whether federal authorities are their only hope to root out entrenched government corruption. Concern over previous corruption cases led to a delay in federal aid for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria as the U.S. government implemented more safeguards.
Thursday's arrest also was a blow to Vázquez's pro-statehood New Progressive Party, which is pushing to hold a referendum next year in a bid to become the 51st U.S. state.
Vázquez, 62, was the second woman to serve as Puerto Rico’s governor and the first former governor to face federal charges. Former Gov. Aníbal Acevedo Vilá of the opposing Popular Democratic Party was charged with campaign finance violations while in office and was found not guilty in 2009. He had been the first Puerto Rico governor to be charged with a crime in recent history.
“For the second time in our history, political power and public office are used to finance an electoral campaign,” said José Luis Dalmau, president of Acevedo's party. “Using the power of the government to advance political agendas is unacceptable and an affront to democracy in Puerto Rico."
Vázquez's consultant, identified as John Blakeman, and the bank president, identified as Frances Díaz, have pleaded guilty to participating in the bribery scheme, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
In early 2019, the international bank owned by Julio Martín Herrera Velutini was being scrutinized by Puerto Rico’s Office of the Commissioner of Financial Institutions because of transactions authorities believed were suspicious and had not been reported by the bank.
Authorities said Herrera and Mark Rossini, the former FBI agent who provided consulting services to Herrera, allegedly promised to financially support Vázquez’s 2020 campaign for governor in exchange for Vázquez dismissing the commissioner and appointing a new one of Herrera’s choosing.
Authorities said Vázquez accepted the bribery offer and in February 2020 demanded the commissioner’s resignation. She then was accused of appointing a former consultant for Herrera’s bank as the new commissioner in May 2020. After the move, officials said Herrera and Rossini paid more than $300,000 to political consultants to support Vázquez’s campaign.
A flurry of messages exchanged during that time between people involved in the case included a heart emoji attached to the commissioner's resignation letter and three sealed lips emojis when someone provided Rossi's name to Vázquez, who requested the name of “the guy from the FBI.” In addition, Herrera texted Rossini about the need for a campaign manager and said he didn't want “a monkey from Puerto Rico.”
After Vázquez lost the primary to current Gov. Pedro Pierluisi, authorities said Herrera then allegedly sought to bribe Pierluisi to end an audit into his bank with favorable terms. Herrera is accused of using intermediaries from April 2021 to August 2021 to offer a bribe to Pierluisi’s representative, who was actually acting under FBI orders, according to the indictment.
Officials said Herrera then ordered a $25,000 payment to a political action committee in hopes of trying to bribe Pierluisi.
Stephen Muldrow, U.S. Attorney for Puerto Rico, said Pierluisi is not involved in the case.
Vázquez, Herrera and Rossini are each charged with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and honest services wire fraud. If they are found guilty on all counts, they could face up to 20 years in prison, officials said.
Meanwhile, Díaz and Blakeman could face up to five years in prison, officials said.
Muldrow said officials believe Herrera is in the United Kingdom and Rossini in Spain. It wasn’t clear if the U.S. would seek to extradite them.
Rossini resigned from the FBI in November 2008 as part of a plea deal in which he pleaded guilty to criminally accessing a sensitive FBI database for personal purposes. Many of the searches were related to Anthony Pellicano, an infamous private eye for celebrities who was charged in 2006 with wiretapping certain stars and bribing a police officer.
Attorneys for the other suspects charged in the case could not be immediately reached for comment.
In mid-May, Vázquez's attorney told reporters that he and his client were preparing for possible charges as the former governor at the time denied any wrongdoing.
Vázquez was sworn in as governor in August 2019 after former Gov. Ricardo Rosselló stepped down following massive protests. She served until 2021, after losing the primaries of the pro-statehood New Progressive Party to Pierluisi.
In a statement Thursday, Pierluisi said his administration will work with federal authorities to help fight corruption.
“No one is above the law in Puerto Rico,” he said. “Faced with this news that certainly affects and lacerates the confidence of our people, I reiterate that in my administration, we will continue to have a common front with federal authorities against anyone who commits an improper act, no matter where it comes from or who it may implicate.”
Vázquez previously served as the island’s justice secretary and a district attorney for more than 30 years.
She became governor after Puerto Rico’s Supreme Court ruled that the swearing in of Pierluisi — who had only been nominated as secretary of state — as governor was unconstitutional. Vázquez at the time said she was not interested in running for office and would only finish the nearly two years left in Rosselló’s term.
Rosselló had resigned in late July 2019 after tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans took to the street, angry over corruption, mismanagement of public funds and an obscenity-laced chat in which he and 11 other men including public officials made fun of women, gay people and victims of Hurricane Maria, among others.
Shortly after she was sworn in, Vázquez told the AP that her priorities were to fight corruption, secure federal hurricane recovery funds and help lift Puerto Rico out of a deep economic crisis as the government struggled to emerge from bankruptcy.
During the interview, she told the AP that she had long wanted to be in public service: as a girl, she would stand on her balcony and hold imaginary trials, always finding the supposed defendants guilty.
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