At the root of all this is whether or not the defendents acted illegally in authorizing that the "rock ash" be deposited on Dominican soil without considering thei mpact on the environment where deposited.
It is obvious that they did so out of greed and andfor that reason alone, abrogated their responsibility to the public at large.
To me, this is an "open and shut" case of malfeasance in office by the defendents andthey should be fined and caused to serve time in an appropriate facillity.
Will that happen?? Probably not, due to the propencity by the judicial system to "soft pedal" such transgressions against the laws and good government.

TexasBill

These sorry samples of homo sapiens that don't care a whiff about their fellow humans and certainly don't have any compassion, I witnessed in person the damage that the rock ash did in the coastline in Samana. The many children and adults suffering from breathing problems, skin diseases, rashes, allergies and many other problems.
And now these "cara duras" want to get off bribing or claiming political persecution. And they probably will get off with just a slap in the wrist.
A good way to get some justice and payback from these monsters will be like they to do child molesters in Pakistan where they stick a long shaft up their butt and then raise them up to slide in it until they perish from the pain and blood loss.

Was the Rockash ever removed?

It was supposedly removed with a lot of flair a few months later but the damage was already done since the toxins
permeate and penetrate the ground once it rains and poisons everything underneath, so the damage was already done even if it was removed.
This was a serious crime against humanity and the DR committed by these monsters of greed.
These criminals should be buried up to their neck in rock ash as punishment and left to rot.

Generosa;

The degree of toxidity in the "rock ash" was minimal, to say the least.
In the town of Pepillo Salcedo, the populace, and afew attorneys, triedto claim thet the"RA" was the cause of no less than over 100 different illnesses, from cancer to skin deseases. The former was proven to be a "pipe dream" and scare tactic by the attorneys and other in order to pave the way for numerous liability type law suits. The skin deseases were proven to be the result of theopening of the new water system interfacing with the old one which had lain idle for over a year, growing all sorts of bacteria, fungus and the like. When people filled their sisterns with the new potable water, that washed out the old pipes and carried this old accumulation into the sisterns contaminating the water supply and sickening those not smart enough to add chlorine to the new supply.
In addition, the toxidity report that was issued stated that the levels were within acceptable ranges, ie. not dangerous.
TB

What is at stake here is that so-called "responsible government agents" issued an ILLEGAL permissive order for the import of the Rock Ash without specifying where and how it was to be disposed of.
The thing to remember is that the authorities had no knowledge of toxidity content of the material, nor did they require a test to determine such ahead of time. THAT is the real CRIME. Just another case of incompetant government officials taking money for breaking tehlaw andthat is what they have been indicted about.
Dominicans will be continuously subjected to this sort of inconsiderate behavior on the part of public officials because the judicial system simply isn't strong enough to combat it on their own, nor do they have the incentive to do so.
The reason for this phenomonon is that the only people getting a decent education in this country are the Elite andthese people aren't going to seriously take steps to correct what goes on in government.
TB