SANTO DOMINGO.- The Supreme Court upheld the Superior Land Court’s jurisdiction to hear the case of the hundreds of kilometers of registered lands expropriated in Bahia de las Aguilas beach, located in the southwest municipalities Enriquillo and Pedernales, a ruling that bolster it’s status as a protected area.

The high Court rejected the appeals filed by Jose Luis Guzmán Bencosme, Gilberto Jose, Miguel Nelson Fernandez Mancebo, Mantenimientos y Servicios Fernández, C. por A., Aquilino Antonio Méndez, Manuel Carvajal, Antonio Felix Perez and Manuel Carvajal, against the Superior Territories Court sentence of April 22, 2005.

The land-grab scandal of Bahia de las Aguilas, part of Jaragua National Park, began in the early 1990s when officials in the Administration of Joaquin Balaguer forged land deeds to take over nearly 15 kilometers of pristine beaches.