Mauricio Alfonso Santoyo Velascom: A former policeman, general
and chief of presidential
security, he has been indicted in U.S.
federal court for taking bribes from drug cartels, drug trafficking
with right-wing paramilitaries,
betraying informants who ended up
dead, providing intelligence
to the cartels and undermining U.S.
and Colombia counternarcotics
operations.
U.S. Says Uribe
Security Chief Worked for Drug Cartels, Paramilitaries (El Espectador,
Colombia)
“Santoyo is charged
with providing confidential information obtained through illegal wiretapping to
these criminal organizations, allowing their members to avoid capture, as well as facilitating
drug trafficking to Central America and the United States. According to the
U.S. indictment, to accomplish this, Santoyo worked with other corrupt police officers
and betrayed the names of informants who were later killed.”
Translated By Florizul
Acosta-Perez
June 15, 2012
Colombia
- El Espectador – Original Article (Spanish)
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
has indicted Mauricio Santoyo for having links to the Office
of Envigado [a drug cartel] and the United
Self-Defense Forces of Colombia [a combine of right-wing paramilitaries
classified as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. in 2001].
A former policeman and general, Mauricio Alfonso Santoyo
Velascom, who was also security chief for President Uribe during his first
term, has come under the radar of U.S. justice. The U.S. District Attorney for
Virginia, Neil MacBride, is investigating the retired senior officer for his
alleged links with the Office
of Envigado and the paramilitary forces.
According to El Tiempo,
Santoyo is said to have provided confidential information obtained through
illegal wiretapping to these criminal organizations, allowing their members to avoid
capture, as well as facilitating drug trafficking to Central America and the
United States. According to the U.S. indictment, to accomplish this, Santoyo worked
with other corrupt police officers and betrayed the names of informants who
were later killed.
The newspaper El Espectador
confirmed that the House of Nariño (office of the president) is already aware
of situation of Santoyo, who has been indicted on five charges. Security agency
sources told this newspaper that two other police officers may be linked to the
charges. It is understood that in order to open the case, the U.S. District
Attorney took statements from people who have been extradited [These are thought
to be members of right-wing paramilitaries President Uribe extradited to the
United States].
[Editor’s Note: The May 24 indictment issued by a grand jury
of the Eastern District of Virginia and unsealed last week alleges that Santoyo
received "substantial bribes" in exchange for:
Tipping off the traffickers
to ongoing drug-trafficking investigations as well as wiretaps targeting them.
Promising to
"facilitate the transfer of corrupt police officers, who would further
assist these drug-traffickers in their business."
Notifying traffickers of
upcoming arrest operations, including joint Colombian investigations with the
U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
Conducting unauthorized
wiretaps on behalf of the traffickers.
Provide intelligence collected by Colombian law enforcement to
drug traffickers, including on people later targeted for murder by the
traffickers.]
A controversial figure
It was October 2000, when Colombian prosecutors began
investigating the disappearances of two ASFADDES members
(members of the Association of Family Members of the Detained and Disappeared),
that Santoyo’s name began coming under the intense
scrutiny of Colombian authorities. While Santoyo was head of the GAULA force [an elite anti-kidnapping task force] in Medellin
(July, 1996 to December, 1999), the GAULA Intelligence
section conducted over 1,800 illegal wiretaps, among which were activists with ASFADDES.
Posted
by Worldmeets.US
Santoyo was no longer in GAULA during
the period in which the ASFADDES members disappeared.
However, in 2003, the issue of “tapping” earned him a ban from public office
from the Inspector
General’s Office. According to the Ministry of Public Security, Santoyo, a lieutenant
colonel at the time, allowed men under his command to arrange illegal phone
wiretaps with forged search warrants through Medellin
Public Utilities.
To punish Santoyo, the Inspector General’s Office took
several things into account. Prosecutors whose signatures appear on the wiretap
warrants assert that the signatures were not theirs - and this has been
confirmed by handwriting analysis. A Medellin police sergeant delivered the spurious
documents to Medellin
Public Utilities, while others were faxed from the offices of GAULA.
Evidence in hand, the Inspector General’s Office dismissed
the security secretary of then-President Uribe and disqualified him, along with nine of his subordinates, from holding
public office for five years. But
President Uribe, upon hearing of the ruling, said: “Based on the
facts that the Inspector General’s Office cited to impose the ban, the attorney
general absolved Colonel Santoyo on August 29, 2003, based on a lack of grounds for
continuing the investigation.”
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Uribe indicated at the time that as Santoyo had appealed the
disciplinary decision, the Presidency of the Republic had to await a final determination.
In November, 2004, the attorney general upheld the decision. Santoyo then left Uribe’s security detail but maintained his ties to the police.
In 2006, the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Inspector
General’s Office on the grounds that the offenses had already been invalidated.
In his appeal, Santoyo demanded reinstatement and promotion to proper
rank given his years of service - general. And so, after obtaining the approval
of a general meeting of police and the Congress, approval was given in 2007.
During his promotion ceremony in 2008, General Santoyo was made
police attaché to Italy. Uribe never doubted the legality of his actions, and in interviews like one with RCN
Radio in February, 2007, Uribe said: “I defend Colonel Santoyo,” and
criticized the disciplinary sanction: “the Inspector General’s Office considered
this the story of the year - to have dismissed the president’s security chief.”
At Santoyo’s promotion ceremony, Uribe expressed
“gratitude” for his work.
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