Corruption, Feature, Law & Justice, Politics

U.S. Justice moves ex-President Toledo to more appropriate prison

U.S. Justice moves ex-President Toledo to more appropriate prison
Source: Congress

Ex-President Alejandro Toledo was transferred Friday to Maguire correctional facility in Redwood City, California, following the decision by a U.S. federal judge, Vince Chhabria, that Toledo be released on bail if more appropriate prison conditions were not found.

Toledo, 73, was arrested July 16 for hearings in an extradition process filed by Peru and has since been held in solitary confinement in the Santa Rita jail in Alameda County, a huge facility with one of the highest death rates in U.S. prisons, many by suicide.

“Most people agree that being in solitary is pretty close to torture,” said Chhabria, as reported in Court House News. “Why should that not be considered a special circumstance that would justify somebody’s release?”

“He’s in that cell by himself for 47 hours out of 48 hours, which is the kind of thing that makes people go insane,” Chhabria said.

A psychiatric evaluation of Toledo given to the judge late last week detailed that Toledo’s medication had been increased because his physical and mental health had deteriorated considerably since his arrest, showing “a significant increase of anxiety and depression” and a lack of personal care and hygiene.  The report also said Toledo’s memory was failing and he had marked difficulty in concentrating.

According to a report by El Comercio, the prosecutor said Toledo had requested “special protection” and at Santa Rita the only option was solitary confinement.

A courtroom sketch ofEliane Karp objecting to a ruling in her husband Alejandro Toledo's hearing on Sept. 12, 2019.
A courtroom sketch ofEliane Karp objecting to a ruling in her husband Alejandro Toledo’s hearing on Sept. 12, 2019.

In a mid-September extradition hearing, Toledo had offered to post $1 million bail to be released and put under house arrest. The bail was to be paid by friends in three different states, but the judge, Thomas S. Hixson, considered Toledo to be a flight risk.

According to several press reports, Toledo’s wife, Eliane Karp, had to be forcibly withdrawn from the courtroom after she began shouting at prosecutors.

“It’s the life of a man, goddam it! You’re killing him!” Karp, 65, shouted, saying they would be “personally responsible for his death.”

At the time of his arrest and the search of his home in Menlo Park, police found a suitcase with $40,000 in cash and several flight reservations to Israel.

Toledo’s extradition process began in Peru in March 2018, a year after an investigation was opened on allegations that during his administration (2001-2006) Toledo had received $20 million from Odebrecht, the Brazilian construction firm, to win the bid for the Southern Inter-Oceanic Highway.  In April this year, the head of Odebrecht operations in Peru at the time, Jorge Barata, said he had given Toledo $31mn in bribes for the highway construction project.

Candidate Alejandro Toledo in 2000. Source: El Peruano
Candidate Alejandro Toledo in 2000. Source: El Peruano

Looking back

Toledo’s current situation is a far cry from his presidential campaign in 2000, when he carried the banner against the corruption of President Alberto Fujimori’s 10-year administration and against Fujimori’s contrived bid for a third term.

From the Andean shoeshine boy coming under the wing of Peace Corps volunteers in Chimbote, to high school in California and an economics doctorate from Stanford University, Toledo signed up for the presidential campaign in 2000.

When Toledo entered the race he was an unknown, near the bottom of a list of 17 candidates. President Alberto Fujimori was running for a third term via a convoluted “authentic interpretation” of his 1993 Constitution — which allowed a second consecutive term— arguing that his second term, in 1995, was really his first term after the new Constitution.

The Fujimori campaign “machine” began to pick off the more likely opposition candidates one by one, never believing Toledo would get anywhere. But they hadn’t bargained with an increasing rejection of the dirty politics.

At an American Chamber of Commerce luncheon, Toledo explained his platform alongside another candidate, Federico Salas, who had ridden on horseback from his native Huanuco in a highly-publicized entry to the race. Toledo told business executives he would teach people how to fish rather than hand out food, which the press and Salas —who was later found to have backing from the Fujimori team— immediately used to accuse Toledo of planning to abandon the poor and stop the government’s nationwide food assistance program.  But by then Toledo was one of the only candidates left standing.

Toledo’s Andean descent, obvious in his facial features, was promoted as a plus, his Belgian wife Eliane Karp praised her healthy and sacred “cholo,” and the Peru Posible party chose the Inca cross or chakana as its symbol. He was portrayed as the Andean rebelion against corrupt government.

toledo story Asheshov 1.pngThe irony of being a “cholo” among Lima’s political and business circles was not lost on Toledo, and he had a sense of humor, as former Peruvian Times editor Nick Asheshov recollects (see Box).

Rigged Elections

The elections in April 2000 initially showed Toledo winning by a 10% margin, but hours later Fujimori was the winner. International observers noted there were 10% more votes than voters.  Toledo refused to campaign for the run-off, arguing that the system was rigged.  Fujimori won his third term in office.

The March of the Four Suyos

In protest, Toledo and his party organized a march to Lima from the four cardinal points of what was once the Inca empire (Marcha de los Cuatro Suyos) for July 28, when Fujimori would be sworn in at the Congress.  Despite military and police blockades on main highways and even river routes in the jungle, a million people convened on Lima. The largest demonstration in Peru’s history. The logistics were huge, with tent cities organized by former lawmaker Carlos Bruce.

The marches on July 25, 26 and 27, despite raised eyebrows of disapproval by Lima’s political elite, were peaceful. One observer told Peruvian Times that week that not a single flower was trampled on in the parks where meetings were held.

Memorial Park Banco de la Nacion
A memorial park built on the site of the Banco de la Nación, where six security guards died when the building collapsed from a fire and explosives during demonstrations on July 28, 2000.

On July 28th, however, the government hired gangs to blend among the protestors en route to the Congress.  Fires were started with Molotov cocktails in the National Archives at the Palace of Justice, at the Education ministry, and six guards were killed in the Banco de la Nacion building off Plaza San Martin when it imploded from a fire (later proved to have been triggered from inside).  The Fujimori government blamed Toledo for the deaths but it didn’t stick and when he was elected president in 2001, he created a park in memory of the six guards.

By October 2000, scandals of major corruption and the first of many leaked “Vladivideos” of lawmakers and business executives receiving piles of cash in spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos’ offices, led President Fujimori to schedule a visit to a world conference in Brunei and hand in his resignation by fax from Japan.

A transition government called for elections in April 2001, when Toledo won easily as the standard bearer of good and honest government.   But he was a disappointment, not fulfilling many of his promises, and weak in making many decisions.  His government was by no means even a shadow of the Fujimori authoritarian regime, but his approval ratings were close to the single digits thanks in great part to the relentless Apra and Fujimori opposition.  Rumors of corruption were minor, certainly never considered in a league with Alberto Fujimori or Alan Garcia, and resurfaced only well after his presidency when he bought two expensive properties in Lima, followed by exposure of the huge Odebrecht corruption scandal that has touched much of Latin America.

The U.S. government accepted the extradition hearings in January this year.  Legal analysts believe the hearings could take at least a year.  Justice Chhabria will be reviewing the prison conditions on Oct. 22.  If and when extradition is granted, Alejandro Toledo will held at the special operations police barracks in northeast Lima, where Alberto Fujimori is serving his sentence and where he will have a fairly comfortable space and unlimited visitor privileges.

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