On June 6, 2022, Judge Juan Francisco Rodríguez of the the Sixth Court of Instruction of the National District freed 11 persons charged with aggravated corruption. The decision is a serious blow to the rule of law in the Dominican Republic.

Joint press release: FIDH – Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos (CNDH)

Those involved in the Los Tres Brazos corruption case have been acquitted of all criminal charges brought against them — a decision that leaves hundreds of victims without redress. The decision was handed down on the same day that the Dominican Republic’s environment minister was assassinated for allegedly not cooperating in another corruption scheme.

On 6 June 2022, the judge of the Sixth Court of Instruction of the National District of the Dominican Republic, Juan Francisco Rodríguez Consoró, issued his decision to exonerate the 11 people charged in the Los Tres Brazos case from all responsibility, following the request of the Public Prosecutor’s Office to send them to trial for embezzlement and fraud against the Dominican State.

This case was intended to investigate and punish the sale for a derisory price of land in the Tres Brazos sector in 2016 by the state company CORDE (Corporación Dominicana de Empresas Estatales) to the private company INFEPA-TITULATEC, “a case of extremely serious corruption” as described by the attorney general Jean Rodríguez in 2018. The Comisión Nacional de Derechos Humanos (CNDH-RD), a member organisation of FIDH, became a plaintiff and civil party in the defence of the interests of all inhabitants of Los Tres Brazos.

Click here to read the full release.