The Commander’s Justice

One of the latest public chapters that evince justice’s lack of independence in Nicaragua was a legislative meeting held by Alba Luz Ramos, President of the Supreme Court of Justice, to discuss a bill that punishes fake news, which has been pushed by the government of Daniel Ortega and swiftly passed by Sandinista parliament members last year.

Back in October 2020, in the process of consultation with different stakeholders, a group of bodyguards blocked the access of journalists to Magistrate Ramos, letting her remain silent aboutthe Special Law of Cybercrimes.

What did not come out into the open then was that, at the request of the executive branch, the judicial branch produced the bill that was later submitted by Sandinista parliament members as their own bill. After it became effective last December, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (CIDH) considered it a threat to freedom of speech.

“What we were told is that this had been going on for a year (work to prepare the bill), and the President of the Republic instructed to research how similar laws were being developed in other countries in order to adapt it to the Nicaraguan context”, explained parliament member Mauricio Orue, Vice President of the justice commission to the local newspaper La Prensa. The difference with other occasions in the past decade, is that judicial officials failed to acknowledge Ortega’s meddling in their technical decisions.

Ramos Vanegas, aged 71, has been a magistrate of the Supreme Court since 1988 –almost half her life– and has presided the institution since 2010, supported by Daniel Ortega and the Sandinista party structure. She became a militant of the organization prior to 1979, the years in which young guerrillas were fighting to depose Somoza. She went by the alias of “Natalia” aliases were common practices back then for their protection and their families’.

More than forty years later, young people opposing Ortega post in their social media from anonymous accounts; while the magistrate has the highest rank in the judicial branch, openly acting in the defense of the Nicaraguan Commander, just as a group of her fellow judges that attend political activities. Their offices are decorated with emblems of the FSLN, as seen in a series of images compiled in different moments (2016, 2019) and leaked by employees of the judicial branch for this article. Some are even featured in the institutional website.

Acting as her Vice President in the Supreme Court is Marvin Aguilar Garcia, a Sandinista that was sanctioned by the United States on December 21^st, 2020, for jointly reporting the “objectives of democratic opposition” from his judicial position; in parallel, he acts as national political secretary of the Sandinista Leadership Council in the Supreme Court, enabling direct contact with President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo.

The party’s influence in the judicial structure exceeds 70 percent at national level, liberal magistrate Manuel Martinez revealed in 2014 to the digital newspaper Confidencial “as independent as judges aim to be, if they get a call, they have to take it”. Per the official information on judicial personnel, this means that if there are 394 judges in the country’s agencies and 64 magistrates in the Court of Appeals, around 320 are openly pro-government; the remaining judges must comply or leave the system to avoid complications.

Although Martinez refrained to comment for this article, an interview in October with Jose Antonio Barrientos Watson, former magistrate of appeals, confirms that the FSLN gradually gained control. In 2014, Sandinista legislators managed to appoint ten loyal magistrates out of twelve that make up the Supreme Court of Justice, Appeals was swept (massive layoffs) to strengthen control.

“Judicial independence does not exist. In cases with political or personal interests of Court magistrates, you need to call the magistrate in charge before ruling to see what his/her instructions are”, explains Barrientos Watson, whose dismissal was justified in writing as “convenient to the institution”.

Yader Morazan, a former employee at the courthouse in Matagalpa living in exile, elucidates that the party’s influence in that branch takes place through two structures: CLS (Sandinista Leadership Committees) –of which magistrate Aguilar acts as secretary– and the JS (Sandinista Youth). Both organizations are present in the institution and in the neighborhoods.

Sandinista Magistrates Territories of Service

According to judicial sources, the magistrates of the Supreme Court of Justice divide the territory in constituency districts and render their political services. In 2020, Ramos serviced Managua, capital of Nicaragua; Aguilar was given the northern district; magistrate Juana Mendez was given the western district; magistrate Armengol Cuadra serviced Las Segovias; magistrate Yadira Centeno was given the eastern district; magistrate Ileana Perez was given the southern district; magistrate Gerardo Arce was given the central district; magistrate Ellen Joy Lewis was given the northern and southern Caribbean district. All of them are part of the government’s party.

Officials consulted revealed that when political guidelines are directed at judges, they meet with Ramos, Mendez, Aguilar and Virgilio Gurdian, a former liberal minister appointed in 2014 (although judicial sources state that Sandinistas don’t include him in these decisions). All of these officials are members of the Supreme Court’s Administration Council.

Other orders are sent through the judicial institution’s CLS and the JS. Workers of all areas, including the administrative area, are controlled by unions, which are in charge of affiliating party members within the institution. They also ask for one percent of their salary as “supportive contribution”. Initially, the same sources consulted affirmed that their areas’ politicians (Sandinista commissioners) said everything was meant to be voluntary, but in reality that was not the case.

These “contributions” have been deemed irregular, and are even larger in other State institutions, a fact that has been reported by local media.

The account of former magistrate Barrientos Watson, who claims he was dismissed for political reasons, exemplifies a judicial branch that is biased towards Ortega’s interests. Similar shades of this account can be perceived in stories such as that of Margarito Garcia, a former courthouse employee in the department of Chontales, whose story was shared from jail before being surprisingly released by the Ministry of Governance; or that of Luis Enrique Cuevas, a former political prisoner who has condemned judicial excesses pertaining his case and who was prosecuted for selling the flag of Nicaragua, considered subversive by the government party since 2018.

A report from last December by the CIDH, part of the Organization of American States, criticized the justice system referring to “people imprisoned in the context of the human rights crisis that sparked on April 18^th, 2018”.

The CIDH managed to determine that at least 1,614 people were imprisoned in this context, a process in which the judicial branch had key leverage. The organization reported violations to guarantees and to the right to justice by means of initiating judicial processes “with unfounded charges, using pre-established accusation formats, with fabricated or manipulated evidence, and affectations to the right to a timely, technical and adequate legal defense”.

On April 23^rd, 2018, days after opponents’ protests began, Ramos sent a note to the judicial branch, in which she openly defended Ortega, hinting the public of her position of power and attributing the events to a media-related campaign. “If there is an earthquake here, the opposition is going to protest because the government is to blame for the earthquake”, she said.

According to the CIDH, 328 people were murdered in Nicaragua, most of which were victims of repression. The State assumed it was an attempted coup, although evidence suggesting it was non-existent and protests were peaceful. Subsequently, the government took back control of the streets and judicial processes began. Between April and December 2018, 500 people were imprisoned in Nicaragua due to political motives, as accounted by independent organizations. .

Prosecuted opponents were declared guilty by seven judges with Sandinista backgrounds, three of which were not removed from their position in the system following accusations of bias against the opponents, and instead were recently promoted to magistrates in the Court of Appeals, official information identifies them as Ernesto Rodriguez, Rosario Peralta and Edgar Altamirano. Meanwhile, another judge, Julio Arias, was appointed director of an area of the Supreme Court that monitors lawyers’ activities.

For Vilma Nuñez de Escorcia, a prominent human rights champion on Nicaragua, “judges and magistrates are political operators. We are living in an institutional dictatorship”, she concludes.

Despite criticism to the judicial branch, the President of the Supreme Court did not comment and refused to respond to a request for an interview sent by CONNECTAS to Roberto Larios, spokesperson of the judicial branch. Questioning to this institution transcends the Law of Cybercrimes (on fake news), in the end of 2020, it supported passing other laws to control “foreign agents” who receive funds and attempt creating programs considered by the government to act against “the security of the State”; and it also supported life imprisonment for those who commit “crimes of hate”.

Political meddling goes way back. In the last two decades, several judgments have connected judicial rulings to Ortega’s interests. In 1999, when the Sandinista Commander was accused of rape by his stepdaughter Zoilamerica Narvaez, judge Juana Mendez declared the case expired based on the statute of limitations. Forward twenty years, the judge is now a magistrate supported by FSLN and a proud militant.

“If Sandinismo did not exist, I would not be in politics. But while there is Sandinismo, I am going to be a politician because I am a supporter in the good and the bad times”, magistrate Mendez proudly confessed to the official newspaper Barricada.

In 2010, a year prior to the presidential election, Sandinista magistrates passed the judgment that qualified Ortega –in power since 2007–to run for reelection; reelection was banned by the Constitution.

The judicial branch has eliminated possible electoral FSNL adversaries; in 2008 it removed the legal status of Movimiento Renovador Sandinista, critical of the President. Municipal elections were held that year.

In 2016, the year of the presidential elections, the Supreme Court ruled against the rival Partido Liberal Independiente, several of its members were engaged in an internal legal controversy to represent the organization, this ordeal went on for four years, and it was taken from opponent Eduardo Montealegre, Ortega’s political rival, to give it to another block to which the FSLN had offered the opportunity to lead the party before the judgment took place.

For the US government, the FSLN’s common objectives and the judicial power transcend political interests. The government of that country argues that judgments have been facilitated as a collection mechanism for the party. “Daniel Ortega and the Sandinismo have taken money from international drug traffickers to finance FSLN electoral campaigns in exchange for instructing Sandinista judges to release drug traffickers”, affirmed a cable released by WikiLeaks in 2010. The official response was to consider it a falsehood.

Building up Power in the Courthouses

The Sandinista influence has been in development since Ortega first came out of power after the Sandinista Revolution ended in 1990.

Magistrate Mendez told Barricada that commander Tomas Borge, a founder of the government’s party, deceased, led a strategy to have former officials and guerrilla members study law. “There was a Saturday modality that commander Borge set up for us to study”.

Although with time they became judges and magistrates, and nowadays they act as the most visible muscle of the executive branch, the influence of the FSLN in the Supreme Court strengthened in 2000, according to former Inspector General Alberto Novoa, who occupied the position between 2004 and 2007. The defining moment was the political agreement between President Arnoldo Aleman and Ortega –back then, a member of the opposition–, which enabled institutions to be distributed among both leaders’ supporters.

Eight liberal magistrates and eight Sandinista magistrates made up the Supreme Court. Yet, in 2002, when Aleman was tried for corruption by magistrate Mendez herself, the balance tilted toward Sandinismo. Power quotas were renegotiated, per Novoa, and liberals gave back what they had in exchange for their leader’s freedom.

“Aleman went from Ortega’s senior partner to being his hostage. A fraction of the liberal officials, with their leader sitting in jail, turned to Sandinismo for protection”, Novoa explained.

FSNL’s total takeover of the Supreme Court finally occurred in 2014 when the Parliament’s Sandinista majority appointed new magistrates. Out of sixteen judges, eleven were Sandinistas. Currently, only twelve magistrates remain, three stepped down and one passed away. They were in their positions as of the beginning of 2020.

The layoffs in the Court of Appeals, implemented by Sandinista magistrates from 2014, increased control, revealed former magistrate Jose Antonio Barrientos. “After that sweeping (layoffs), two percent of liberals remained in the judicial branch versus 98 percent Sandinistas, but that two percent votes as an ally to keep their job”, he detailed.

Now with total power, the FSLN radicalized the judicial structures from 2018, the year in which the opposing protests where repressed by police officers and paramilitaries. The aim was to control overall dissatisfaction. Courts don’t tolerate dissent with the official speech either, as evinced by the story of Margarito Garcia, a former courthouse employee in Chontales, he was in jail for eighteen months before being released on December 18^th of last year.

“Those who have been Released (from Jail) are not Afraid”

Before being transferred home as a result of the Ministry of Governance orders granting him the benefit of family coexistence, Garcia, who worked in the courthouses in Chontales, had been in prison, and from there he risked sharing his story with CONNECTAS.

Garcia explained that his mistake was refusing to join the party and to criticize the Army in a public space when the US sanctioned General Julio Cesar Aviles for his refusal to disarm the paramilitaries who repressed the manifestations along with the Police.

He is 47 years old, and he worked eighteen years for the judicial power. He was never notified. Nevertheless, he faced a process for hiding and destroying judicial documents; he believes he was a set up by his superiors.

“I wish for the release of my imprisoned brothers with all my might, (they) don’t deserve being political criminals. Those who have been released (from jail) are not afraid”, Garcia said after being released.

The pressure faced by employees in the judicial branch is not limited to the facts revealed by Garcia. There are also “invitations” to partisan activities, training and some are even requested to send photographs to demonstrate their participation in FSLN activities. These political monitoring tasks are the least public of the interferences.

Rafael Solis, former magistrate, condemned that Nicaragua has witnessed the beginning of a dictatorship with “monarchic” characteristics in the letter he wrote when he stepped down of the position in January 2019.

“Your decisions (Ortega and Murillo) substitute the entire judicial branch, including our own judges, whom I defend seeing as they have no alternative other than to obey the orders coming from El Carmen (presidential residence) and the Attorney General’s Office, otherwise they risk being dismissed”, said Solis.

One of the points that the former magistrate Solis criticized was political trials. The case of businessman Luis Enrique Cuevas illustrates the excess of political meddling in the judicial decision-making process. Cuevas was sentenced to three years and six months in jail for selling flags of Nicaragua. As previously explained, this national symbol is considered subversive by the government since the opposition waves it in rallies.

Cuevas’ tragedy began on September 9^th, 2018. On this day, he sold flags, bands and vuvuzelas in the “marcha de los globos” to take advantage of the crowds. He was captured and his products were confiscated. He was in shock when he was accused of criminal possession of weapons.

They broke into my house and took my new motorcycle, I had bought it six months prior. I never saw it again. They stole it along with the products I bought with a loan I still owe. They took all of the money I had made that day. I was released but never had anything returned. When I made my claim they told me: do you want us to send you to jail again”, Cuevas declared last October.

His release, as Garcia’s, was possible due to orders from the Ministry of Governance, but this was on February 28^th, 2019 while negotiating with the opposition, since then, he has been subject to harassment.

His is just another story in the files that have been questioned on the grounds of Sandinismo judges’ bias. Recently, the United States sanctioned the Attorney General Ana Julia Guido a Sandinista, for fabricating files against members of the opposition.

Former Attorney General Arnulfo Lopez, a current advocate of people considered political prisoners by human rights organizations, thinks that the country has basically gone back to a system that applies positions and guidance and “nowadays, people being tried are guilty from the moment of their arrest”.

But the victims of the judicial branch also include Sandinistas. In 2019, the Supreme Court terminated Indiana Gallardo, former judge ninth of the Penal Hearing District of Managua, because she allowed family members of political prisoners to attend a preliminary hearing. To justify her dismissal, the Court resorted to alleged complaints against her by the Attorney General’s Office.

In contrast with Gallardo, other officials were lucky to receive partisan favors. Otoniel Arauz Torres was an alternate judge in the Sole Local Court of San Ramon, Matagalpa, a rural community in northern Nicaragua. Yet, that fact did not stop him from joining paramilitary groups that attacked the population in the 2018 protests.

According to witnesses, the official fired a small automatic assault rifle against a citizens’ rally. The case gained notoriety thanks to citizen reports, but the authorities response was to avoid investigation, he is now an incumbent judge.

Despite his support to the FSLN becoming a public matter, Arauz’s case (dubbed as the paramilitary judge by the media) shows the extent to which the government party controls the system and how it prioritizes a politicized justice that ‘does not mess around’ with the opposition.