An Ecuadorian judge on Saturday ordered the release on health terms, on restrictive terms, of former Vice President Jorge Glass, jailed since 2017, convicted of corruption, his lawyer Edison Loisa said.
The judge clarified that the “serious health problems” of Mr. Glass, 52 years old, justify the decision to release him early, however, he forbade him to leave the country and ordered him to appear before a justice officer in Guayaquil (southwest) once a month. .
The government of Conservative President Guillermo Lasso has said it opposes the decision, expressing its “legal disagreement” without making it clear what it intends to do to overturn it.
Mr Glass, vice-president of Socialist President Rafael Correa from 2013 to 2017, who was re-elected in 2017 alongside former President Lenin Moreno, was sentenced to six years in prison after being found guilty of bribery by Brazilian construction company Odebrec. He was sentenced to another eight years in prison after a second trial, on charges that he had asked businessmen in exchange for public contracts.
In January 2021, he was sentenced to another eight years in prison for misusing funds from the oil sector, but the defense appealed.
After his re-election in 2017, Mr. Glass was brought to justice, which was then investigating the Odebrecht scandal. He was forced to resign after his first-instance conviction. The former Korean president has also been sentenced to 8 years in prison for a corruption case in 2020. He has been living in Belgium, his wife’s home country, since 2017.
Both Mr. Glass, who served some 4.5 years of his sentence, and Mr. Korea denied the allegations from the outset, denouncing their political persecution.
Videos uploaded to social media sites show Mr Glass as he greeted hundreds of gathered supporters as he was released from prison on Sunday.
Fausto Harin, a member of parliament for Glas’s party, said the decision also “violated” legal guarantees and insecurity in the prison system, which prevents the former vice president from receiving medical care.
Twenty people were killed in a prison in Cuenca this month. Last year, 316 people were killed in Ecuadorian prisons in incidents attributed to authorities by organized crime gangs.
SOURCE: AMPE
Source: Capital
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