This April 14 the new Constitutional Court (CC) takes office, but judicial sources warn of maneuvers by the Public Ministry (MP) for the issuance of an arrest warrant against the elected magistrate, Astrid Lemus.
The lawyer was elected titular magistrate of the new CC in the last elections of the College of Lawyers and Notaries of Guatemala (Cang), an election process that is under investigation by the MP.
During the election, the voting centers in Guatemala City were subject to a series of raids due to a confidential case, for which now, according to sources, the issuance of an arrest warrant is being sought.
This case is assigned to the sixth criminal court, a judiciary that would not have resolved favorably to the MP, according to a judicial source who preferred not to be named for security reasons.
Given this, the MP would have challenged the judge in charge of the case, but he chose to recuse himself after being accused of lack of objectivity, causing the file, for reasons of jurisdiction, to be assigned to the Third Criminal Chamber.
The sources have confided to Prensa Libre that on April 13 the case has already been submitted to this Court of Appeals, a body that months ago authorized arrest warrants in one of the cases in charge of the MP.
On that occasion, more than 20 arrest warrants were issued, including one against Iván Velásquez, head of the defunct International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).
These arrest warrants were rejected, since the Chamber of Amparos of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ) considered that the Chamber had exceeded its functions by issuing arrest warrants, tasks that are the responsibility of judges.
Information also emerged that the MP requested an arrest warrant against Lemus for the Take USAC Case, on April 10, a case handled by the Tenth Criminal Court, of which the meaning of the resolution is unknown until now.
The prosecutor’s office handling this case was asked if they had made any judicial request along those lines, but so far no response has been obtained.
The MP was also consulted through another means to find out if in the last hours or days they have made judicial requests regarding Lemus, but no response has been obtained either.