Police break the door of Dina Boluarte’s house to seize luxury watches – Publimetro México

Police broke the lock on the door of Peruvian President Dina Boluarte’s house on Friday night during a raid to seize three Rolex luxury watches as part of a preliminary prosecutorial investigation for alleged enrichment and failure to testify. of the State.

During the early hours of Saturday, the prosecutors and police officers carrying out the investigation led by the attorney general, Juan Villena, left Boluarte’s house and headed to the presidential palace, where they entered without using force, to continue the raid. ordered by a Supreme Court judge.

🇵🇪In the early morning, in a historic event, the Peruvian police broke the door of the president’s house @DinaErciliia Dina Boluarte, to initiate a search procedure for the Rolex case. In this regard, the Prime Minister, Gustavo Adrianzén said: “I do not think it is a crisis.” pic.twitter.com/1qlpzNx95G

— David Ordaz (@david_ordaz) March 30, 2024

Unprecedented case

It is the first time in the history of Peru that the police and the prosecutor’s office forcibly entered the home of a sitting president, in a country accustomed to the justice system ordering searches in the homes of former presidents or issuing preventive detention for former officials investigated for alleged corruption.

The raids on the presidential palace had occurred before. Local television stations showed at the stroke of midnight police officers from the highly complex investigations division breaking the lock on the door of the president’s house with a metal sledgehammer after waiting in vain for several minutes for someone to open it. Boluarte has not appeared in public or made any statements.

In an unusual interview during the early hours of the morning, the Prime Minister, Gustavo Adrianzén, told RPP radio that Boluarte was in the presidential palace residence and added that what happened was not “serious,” that “a storm was being generated where it could not be there is” and added that the work of the prosecutor’s office is causing “a political noise that affects investments.”

Adrianzén affirmed, without providing evidence, that there is a “destabilizing intention” to hit the president led by those who “manage organized crime” and who 14 months ago demanded her dismissal in protests that left 49 civilians dead in confrontations with security forces. security. The investigation against Boluarte “in any other place, would be nothing more than an anecdote,” he added.

The attorney general, Juan Villena, said on Tuesday that Boluarte showed “a clear indicator of rebellion” in a written response to his defense, which sought to postpone the president’s exhibition and statements for two weeks due to her “heavy schedule.” The Associated Press obtained a copy of the attorney general’s response.

Boluarte’s attitude contradicts his promises last week, when to avoid questions he told the press that he was going to appear before prosecutors to tell “the truth.”

The president has been embroiled in a political crisis for two weeks for not explaining how the Rolexes that she has displayed in public activities came to be on her right wrist. At the beginning, she said that at least one of the watches was “from yesteryear,” “the fruit” of her “effort” since she was 18, and she asked the press “not to get into personal issues.”

His ministers indicated there were more important issues and Adrianzén even left a conference in anger when reporters insisted on whether the watches were purchased or gifts.

In parliament, a group of legislators began gathering signatures last week to call for Boluarte’s ouster. The president responded by stating “I am not afraid of vacancies.”

In his response on Tuesday, the attorney general indicated that Boluarte’s conduct “does nothing more than delay the outcome of the investigation” and that, in her capacity as a senior public official, “she has the power to use leave by express summons.” judicial, military or police.” Villena specified that it is essential that the president, or whoever she designates, “exhibit as soon as possible the three Rolex watches that are the subject of this investigation, so that effects are not generated that could be irreversible and prevent having those objects by disposition. improper, loss, destruction or deterioration, which may affect the investigation.”

The investigation into the use of luxury watches began in mid-March when the journalistic program “La Encerrona” stated that it reviewed thousands of official photos in an investigation into the watches used by the president and highlighted among all of them a Rolex that in Peru is worth up to $14,000. Other programs then detected at least two more Rolexes.

Boluarte, a 61-year-old lawyer, was a modest official in a district identity registration office until her inauguration as vice president of the country on July 28, 2021, with then-president Pedro Castillo.

She became his Minister of Social Inclusion with a salary of $8,136 a month. When parliament removed Castillo on December 7, 2022, Boluarte assumed the presidency with a lower salary, $4,200. Shortly after she began exhibiting luxury watches.

All officials are required to declare their assets to avoid possible cases of illicit enrichment, and Boluarte’s asset declarations do not record any Rolex.

What’s happening in Peru?

Several of the presidents who ruled the country in the last two decades are plagued by cases of corruption: Alejandro Toledo (2001-2006) and Pedro Castillo (2021-2022) are in provisional prison while they are investigated; Ollanta Humala (2011-2016) faces a trial in which the prosecution requests 20 years in prison for money laundering; Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018) cannot leave the country after having been under house arrest and his successor, Martín Vizcarra (2018-2020), whose home was recently searched at dawn, is also being investigated for alleged corruption.

The most tragic case was that of Alan García (2006-2011), who committed suicide in his bedroom by shooting himself in the head in 2019, minutes before the police preliminarily detained him for 10 days.

The raid on the former president’s house occurred on Friday, April 17, during Holy Week. It is not the only case pending with the justice system of the president, whose popularity in February was barely 8%, according to the Ipsos Peru firm.

The prosecution denounced her in November before Congress for aggravated homicide and serious injuries in relation to the 49 deaths in clashes with security forces during protests demanding her resignation.