The Federal Prosecutor’s Office “cannot ask for a conviction for the crime it decided not to prosecute”.

So concludes a motion by the defense of former Governor Wanda Vázquez Garced to insist that the Federal Court in San Juan eliminate the one-year prison sentence recommendation for the former governor.

A day after the Public Ministry defended its prison proposal, Vázquez Garced’s lawyers asked Judge Silvia Carreño Coll to allow him to reiterate their position that the Prosecutor’s Office violated the plea agreement.

In August 2022, a Grand Jury indicted Vázquez Garced, Venezuelan banker Julio Herrera Velutini and financial advisor Mark Rossini for an alleged corruption scheme of bribery and fraud.

After extensive negotiations, the parties agreed that the defendants would plead guilty to the lesser included offense of violation of campaign laws.

In yesterday’s motion, the attorneys charged that the prosecution “seeks to have Vázquez sentenced by this Court and tried in the court of public opinion, not for the misdemeanor campaign finance violation to which she pleaded guilty, but for the bribery and corruption charges” in the original pleading “which it agreed to dismiss.”

According to the defense, the prosecution’s central argument is based on a “semantic game”.

“(The prosecution) claims that Vázquez ‘accepted the political contributions he was promised,’ confusing the acceptance of a promise with the acceptance of actual contributions,” the lawyers said.

“However, the law criminalizes both separately: it prohibits accepting ‘a contribution or donation’ or ‘a promise to make a contribution or donation’. These are separate offenses,” they explained.

They argued that the stipulation of facts in the plea agreement “confirms this distinction.”

“The parties stipulated that ‘the value of the pledged contribution was in excess of $15,000, but did not exceed $25,000,’” the defense noted.

He stressed that “the stipulation quantifies the pledge, not the actual contributions received. This was not careless drafting; it reflects the nature of the crime.”

He insisted that “two facts remain undisputed: no foreign money was ever received for his campaign and he was not provided with actionable assistance.”

According to the lawyers, the U.S. Attorney’s Office also misrepresented the status of the objections to the presentence report.

They further alleged that he threatened liability for filing a legitimate challenge, used his duty of candor to circumvent the plea agreement, threatened to resurrect the bribery prosecution while simultaneously using bribery allegations to justify his sentencing recommendation, and mischaracterized the convict’s accurate factual statements as “false.”

The defense argued that the Prosecution’s expression in defending the sentencing recommendation, “instead of refuting, confirms the non-compliance” with the agreement.

“His aggressive rhetoric cannot hide the fact that he continues to advocate for the statutory maximum penalty based on conduct that exceeds the negotiated limits in the plea agreement,” he said.

Sentencing hearings for Vázquez Garced, Herrera Velutini and Rossini are scheduled for January 29.

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This content was translated from Spanish to English using artificial intelligence and was reviewed by an editor before being published.