High Court issues stunning ruling against collaborator of powerful ex-president

Santo Domingo.- In a stunning development, Dominican Republics’ Supreme Court on Friday ruled against a request by senator Félix Bautista to drop the money laundering charges, and set for October 1 the first hearing in the case against he close collaborator of the powerful former president Leonel Fernandez.

The high Court of had scheduled the hearing on a challenge filed by the civic movement Citizens Against Corruption (C3) for July 23, but was suspended until hearing the appeal by the lawmaker.

The decision upholds the Special Instruction Court ruling handed down in February against the acquittal filed by C3, accusing the lawmaker from San Juan province of bribing Haitian officials during the administrations of Fernández and then Haiti president René Préval.

After the quake that leveled Port-au-Prince in Jan. 2010, the then head of the powerful State Works Supervisory Engineers Office (OISOE) had stated that if contracted, he would “rebuild the entire country of Haiti.”