The Prosecutor’s Office Ecuador announced this Wednesday that it will begin an investigation against the former Minister of the Interior Jose Serrano for allegedly disseminating information considered confidential about the murder this same day of the prosecutor Cesar Suarezshot down by hitmen in the city of Guayaquil.
The Prosecutor’s Office, in a message on its X network account (formerly Twitter), assured that “will open an investigation into José SS for alleged dissemination of confidential information, due to his ‘revelations’ regarding sensitive topics”, like the case of the Suárez crime.
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Furthermore, the Public ministry urged citizens to “Do not spread speculations that could benefit criminals or people wanted by the law”.
In its message, the Prosecutor’s Office published a photograph of a message written by Serrano, but only showed certain lines of the text, since he placed a layer to cover the rest of the writing.
In that message, the former Minister of the Interior in the Government of the former president Rafael Correa (2007-2017) assured that the murder of prosecutor Suárez by hitmen occurred in a complicated context in the country, due to the Government’s fight against organized crime gangs.
“The hitman of one of the best prosecutors in the country occurs in a much more serious and complex context.”, and the agents of the Public Ministry, mostly honest, are at risk for “some rogue infiltrator who must be discovered who he is“wrote Serrano, who was a harsh critic of the past conservative government Guillermo Lasso (May 2021-November 2023).
The former minister linked the incident to alleged investigations by the magistrate about the environment of José Adolfo Macías Villamar ‘Fito‘, the leader of the criminal gang ‘The Choneros‘who escaped from the Guayaquil Regional Prison.
After learning of the announcement of the opening of the investigation by the Prosecutor’s Office, Serrano insisted that “An urgent investigation is needed to determine who leaked information requested by Prosecutor Suárez to the criminals who ordered him to be killed”.
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“I will always be ready to collaborate with whatever Justice requires of me. I have not lied to the country nor am I going to lie to it now.“, held.
The prosecutor Cesar Suarez He was murdered this Wednesday afternoon by hitmen who shot him inside his vehicle, at a time when he was allegedly going to the hearing in a drug trafficking case and did not have an assigned security team.
Suárez had recently interrogated the thirteen detainees who burst into the canal armed on January 9 TC Television and they kept their workers kidnapped for several hours during a live broadcast.
The murder of the prosecutor occurred in the middle of the state of emergency due to “internal armed conflict” declared by the Government against 22 organized crime gangs, dedicated mainly to drug trafficking, and which the Executive has classified as terrorist groups and belligerent non-state actors to be neutralized by law enforcement forces.
This after the wave of violence experienced on January 9 and attributed to organized crime, where in addition to the seizure of the canal, there were kidnappings of police officers, murders, explosive devices, vehicle fires and riots in prisons with around 200 hostages already released.
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The State Attorney General, Diana Salazardeplored Suárez’s crime and said that the Public Ministry will not stop its fight against organized crime groups.
“This atrocious event brings with it a message for the work we are carrying out through justice in Ecuador.“, but “Organized crime groups, criminals, terrorists will not stop our commitment to Ecuadorian society”said Salazar.
The prosecutor said that the Prosecutor’s Office has undertaken the first investigations into the murder of Suárez and after expressing condolences to his family, he assured that his legacy will accompany the Public Ministry’s fights against crime.
