Page 11 - ARUBA TODAY

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WORLD NEWS Friday 22 december 2017

Venezuelan prosecutors look to settle scores from exile

in Caracas five months arrest when he tried to trav-
ago with just $400 in cash el to Brazil in July to collect
and barely a change of evidence in a region-wide
clothes. bribery scandal involving
He ended up in neighbor- Brazilian construction giant
ing Colombia, where he Odebrecht. He managed
is one of a half-dozen ex- to leave by using an alter-
iled prosecutors and for- native ID that permits Ven-
mer aides to ousted Ven- ezuelan citizens to cross
ezuelan chief prosecutor into Colombia and then
Luisa Ortega working with caught a flight to Brazil.
authorities in the U.S. and Two weeks later, he
elsewhere to build cas- watched in shock as one
es against senior officials of the prime targets of his
many blame for destroying investigations, Venezu-
their homeland. elan United Socialist Party
Their efforts have yet to boss Diosdado Cabello,
lead to any charges — a accused him on live TV of
sign to some that Maduro helping run a $6 million ex-
has succeeded in destroy- tortion ring. “My ears be-
ing Venezuela’s justice sys- gan to get hot and red,”
tem and that Ortega, in her he said. “I felt completely
rush to carve out a political impotent. Like my whole
Venezuelan prosecutor Pedro Lupera walks on a pedestrian bridge in Bogota, Colombia. Lupera, future for herself, has prom- life had been destroyed.”
one of a dozen prosecutors and former aides who fled Venezuela with ousted chief prosecutor ised more than she can de- Ortega, a longtime admir-
Luisa Ortega, is now working with authorities in the U.S. and elsewhere to build cases against
senior Venezuelan officials they blame for destroying their homeland. liver. er of the late Hugo Chavez,
(AP Photo/Fernando Vergara) But for Lupera, like many of broke with the government
his colleagues, the crusade this year over what she said
By JOSHUA GOODMAN Lupera searches through Venezuela that he hopes is deeply personal. was Venezuela’s descent
Associated Press scanned copies of con- will bring about the down- Once in charge of the into dictatorship when
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) tracts, invoices and bank fall of socialist President country’s most politically Maduro gutted the oppo-
— In a cramped office in wire instructions — all part Nicolas Maduro. explosive cases, he dis- sition-controlled National
Colombia’s capital, where of a trove of hundreds of Once one of Venezuela’s covered that intelligence Assembly and created a
a single window looks onto thousands of pages of evi- top anti-corruption prose- agents had cancelled his parallel constitutional as-
a narrow air shaft, Pedro dence smuggled out of cutors, Lupera left his home passport and ordered his sembly to rule supreme.q
Survivors of Mexico bus crash leave hospitals, victims ID’d

By CHRIS SHERMAN that killed eight Americans, nical College near Tacoma tims and loved ones. tion indicated the driver
PHUONG LE two Swedes, a Canadian for nearly two decades, Haim Shababo of Fort Lau- lost control of the bus and
Associated Press and a Mexican tour guide according to their employ- derdale said Wednesday when he tried to get it back
MEXICO CITY (AP) — In- as they traveled from cruise ers, who were notified by a that his mother-in-law, Fan- on the narrow highway, the
jured survivors of a south- ships to visit Mayan ruins family member. Both were ya Shamis, was among the bus flipped, struck a tree
eastern Mexico bus crash south of the beach destina- 51. American bus passengers and landed in vegetation
that killed 11 foreign tour- tion of Tulum. The Swedish and Canadian killed in the crash. along the roadside, state
ists began leaving hospi- In Washington state, of- governments confirmed About 20 people were in- prosecutor Miguel Angel
tals and heading home ficials said Jody Fritz and the deaths of their citizens, jured but only four tourists Pech Cen told reporters.
on Thursday as two of the her husband Andy Fritz but the U.S. Embassy in — one Brazilian and three Jody Fritz was a dedicated
dead were identified as died. She was an assistant Mexico City confirmed only Americans — remained in educator who had recently
long time educators from principal at an elementary that there were “multiple” local hospitals on Wednes- started work at her school
Washington state. school in the small town American deaths and sev- day, according to prosecu- and made a deep im-
Authorities said driver neg- of Belfair and her husband eral injuries. A statement tors in Mexico’s Quintana pression, said North Mason
ligence and excessive taught environmental sci- said the embassy had staff Roo state. A preliminary School District Superinten-
speed caused the crash ence at Clover Park Tech- on the ground assisting vic- manslaughter investiga- dent Dana Rosenbach.q