Prosecutor's Office formally accused former senator Musa Besaile's lawyer for paying bribes at the Toga Cartel

The Public Prosecutor's Office formally accused lawyer Luis Ignacio Lyons España for the crime of bribery to give and offer, when he was defending former senator Musa Abraham Besaile who was prosecuted in 2014 for having ties with paramilitary groups. This criminal conduct was reportedly committed by the lawyer within the sounding scandal of the Toga Cartel, which was uncovered in 2017 and which involved several justices of the Supreme Court of Justice, who in exchange for bribes would have granted judicial benefits in cases that reached that court.

Former magistrates Francisco Ricaurte and Gustavo Enrique Malo Fernández, through convicted former anti-corruption prosecutor Luis Gustavo Moreno and lawyer Leonardo Pinilla, accused of being alias Porcino, had allegedly agreed to receive 2 billion pesos from Lyons and thus favor Besaile.

“The evidence shows that Lyons España, as the defender of the former congressman, heeded a proposal made to him by lawyer Luis Gustavo Moreno to stop an arrest warrant against his client and other actions,” they explained in the Prosecutor's Office.

In the investigation by the prosecutor, they found that there was a down payment of 300 million pesos that were delivered at two different times and 150 were for Lyons España.

The investigating body indicated that after this judicial diligence, hearings to prepare for trial before a judge of the Bogotá circuit would begin in May.

For this case of links with paramilitary groups, Musa Besaile tried to submit to the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), but in January of this year he was expelled by decision of the Appeals Section, and again the trial against the former senator would be left to the Supreme Court of Justice.

According to the station's knowledge, the judges reportedly confirmed the decision of first instance, in which the Definition Chamber had expelled him from the JEP after concluding that, “his stories do not constitute full truth, they do not provide relevant information to reveal the dynamics of the armed conflict in Colombia and it is also noted that they show a lack of proactive and serious attitude” as read in Resolution 3525 of 2021.

In the same vein, the ruling explained that Besaile must “present an additional truth in order for its process to fulfill the purposes of the JEP, since it must provide other elements that would make it possible to clarify facts related to the armed conflict”.

However, Besaile's attitude “during the proceedings was more aimed at contesting his responsibility for the facts investigated than at providing full truth,” the JEP argued in the ruling that would have been confirmed.

At the time, the judgment ordered that Besaile's file for the crime of concert to commit a crime should be referred to the Special Investigation Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice, and it also requested that the JEP be excluded from the proceedings before the Office of the Procurator and the Council of State.

In addition, it also ordered “not to grant the benefit of temporary, conditional and early release” that Besaile had requested.

It is worth remembering that the president of the JEP, Eduardo Cifuentes, after Besaile was expelled from the JEP, said on Blu Radio that the former congressman was neither exact nor concrete and that, “the JEP cannot be a scamper of politicians.” He also recalled that those who do not contribute to the truth are expelled for an incident of non-compliance.

It is important to emphasize that Besaile had filed a guardianship because his right to due process and human dignity had allegedly been violated. Guardianship that became known was rejected in the first days of January 2022.

It should be recalled that, at first, the JEP admitted the submission of former Senator Besaile for crimes of concert to commit an aggravated crime, bribery and embezzlement by appropriation, which have to do with his links with the United Self-Defense Forces of Córdoba and Urabá in order to obtain his election as senator.

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