Trial against Guatemalan president's brother, son begins
AUGUST 30, 2017 / 5:28 PM / 19 HOURS AGO
Reuters Staff
3 MIN READ
GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) - A fraud trial against the brother and son of Guatemalan president Jimmy Morales began on Wednesday amid a scandal touched off by the president’s attempt to expel the leader of a U.N.-backed anti-corruption unit investigating the case.
Guatemala’s top tribunal, the Constitutional Court, ruled definitively on Tuesday against Morales’ internationally criticized push to expel from the country Ivan Velasquez, the Colombian who leads the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).
The CICIG and the prosecutor’s office accuse Samuel “Sammy” Morales, the president’s brother and one of his closest advisers, and Jose Manuel Morales, one of the leader’s four sons, of facilitating false receipts that defrauded the national property registry in 2013, two years before Morales was elected. They deny any wrongdoing.
Neither of the two gave a declaration before a judge on Wednesday, where they appeared together with another 20 other defendants.
More:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-guatemala-corruption-idUKKCN1BA2ZC?rpc=401&
