The demons of the Americas star in the first hours of the investigation into the assassination of Ecuador’s anti-corruption candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, produced a few days before the presidential elections on August 20. Hitmen, drug trafficking and organized crime emerge from the shadows of the plot that the local security forces, with the help of the US FBI and the Colombian police, have begun to unravel after the murder of the journalist, the main civil whip against government corruption. former.
In the midst of the state of emergency imposed by the Government and with a dejected and fearful country, the State Attorney General’s Office yesterday began the process against the six alleged Colombian hitmen arrested during the operations on Thursday. The investigators have found 22 elements of conviction to accuse all of them, including the two men who were recognized in the vicinity of the scene of the attack, in Quito. They have been ordered preventive detention for 30 days due to the “serious danger of flight.”
The Construye candidate and the Gente Buena movement received several long-distance shots, according to ballistic tests. Among the confiscated weapons is a rifle, whose projectiles match the casings found in the vicinity. Investigators also found the fingerprint of one of the six Colombians on the motorcycle used to flee the scene.
Thanks to the various searches carried out in the capital, two motorcycles and a stolen vehicle were found, in the trunk of which part of the commando arsenal was hidden: rifles, four pistols, a submachine gun, four ammunition boxes with 348 cartridges and two rifle magazines. plus three grenades. Previously, the Police had detonated a grenade thrown at the crime scene.
The Colombian media reported at the time that the six detainees have extensive criminal histories, mainly related to drug trafficking, but which also include homicide, theft and illegal possession of weapons. Andrés Manuel Mosquera, José Neider López, Adey García, Camilo Andrés Romero, Jules Castaño and Jhon Gregore Rodríguez would be part of different organized crime groups, according to the Ecuadorian authorities.
At least two of them benefited from grace measures provided by the judges in the days prior to the attack. The Government has lashed out hard in recent months against the courts that have released those they considered dangerous criminals.
CALLS TO POLITICIANS
Among the seized properties are several mobile phones. And this is where the assassination of Villavicencio becomes even more cloudy: according to the Colombian chain Caracol, several calls were made between the detainees and three Ecuadorian politicians. The authorities, for the moment, have not confirmed the news from the Colombian channel.
Little is also known about the hitman who died after being shot near the scene of the crime. The Prosecutor’s Office has not offered more information beyond confirming his death. The facts are confusing, even in the images collected from a nearby building it is observed how agents and citizens fiercely beat an individual. In total, nine people were injured during the shooting.
Ecuador’s criminal laws are very harsh against this type of crime, up to 26 years for murder, plus aggravating circumstances for assassination and for having been carried out during a public gathering. At least a dozen cases precede the death of the anti-corruption journalist, including last month that of the mayor of Manta, Agustín Intriago, the most popular in the country. The Manta coast is a key location for the drug trafficking network, which has turned the Ecuadorian coast into one of its favorite bridges for sending cocaine to Europe and the United States.
ASSASSINATION OF THE PRESIDENT OF HAITI
The arrest of the alleged Colombian hitmen immediately reminded in their country of origin of the assassination that ended the life of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse in 2021. About twenty former Colombian soldiers turned mercenaries participated in the operation against the politician who wanted to reform the Caribbean country.
More similar in profile to those now detained are the hitmen who ended the life of the Paraguayan anti-corruption prosecutor Marcelo Pecci, murdered a year ago during his honeymoon on an island in the Colombian city of Cartagena. The gunman who fired was the Venezuelan Wendret Carrillo, hired in Medellín and who had worked for the Tren de Aragua, the Venezuelan criminal group that has spread throughout the continent and is directed from the Tocorón prison by El Niño Guerrero. The rest of the band members were Colombians.
The hours after the murder have also left thunderous clashes on social networks, such as the one starring Villavicencio’s widow, Verónica Sarauz, and the correísta candidate, Luisa González. In an electoral spot, the standard-bearer of the Citizen Revolution took advantage of the situation to emphasize the crimes committed by the drug trafficking mafia, to sentence that “criminal violence kills us all, kills society, kills democracy. We will make Ecuador a country of peace again.”
The video provoked the indignation of Sarauz: “Enough is enough, you are the ones who sowed terror in the country, you agreed with the narco-criminal gangs, you were the ones who raided and persecuted us for years, you who stole public resources. And they are you who maintain links with criminal gangs”.
