Lawyer offered bribes to free drug trafficker and overturn Correa’s convictions, judge testifies

Former Manabi criminal judge Joffre Rivera said Wednesday that he was offered money in exchange for releasing gang leader Leandro Norero, alias El Patron, from prison. Rivera, testifying in the Plaga case, also said that Norero’s lawyer, Cristian Romero, pressured him to make rulings allowing former President Rafael Correa to return to Ecuador.

Former President Rafael Correa

Rivera, who was arrested for accepting bribes in other cases and is a protected witness in the Plaga case, says Romero promised to “cleanse” Rivera’s record of judicial misconduct in an unrelated case. Romero, who was also the lawyer for former Vice President Jorge Glas, was charged in the Plaga case but fled the country before he could be arrested.

In his testimony, Rivera described meetings with other judges and lawyers who accepted payments from criminal gangs in exchange for legal favors for imprisoned gang members. In one instance, former judge Marcos Montero, assigned to the Bahía de Caráquez prison, encouraged Rivera to “collaborate” with Lenin Vimos “to take precautions in favor of people who have been deprived of their liberty.”

Vimos, identified by prosecutors as a “ringleader” in the Plaga case, was the central figure in Tuesday’s testimony by former Turi prison director Xavier Raúl Armijos. Vimos, who is awaiting trial, was described by Armijos as the man who paid off judges to give favorable rulings to convicted gang members.

In his testimony Wednesday, Rivera said Romero had presented him with prepared legal documents to challenge and overturn Correa’s two corruption convictions. “He (Romero) said all I had to do was go to court and file the petitions,” Rivera said. He added that Romero had told him that Judicial Council President Wilman Terán was aware of the plan that would allow Correa to return from exile in Belgium to run in the 2023 cross-death election.

Terán was later arrested on suspicion of corruption and is still awaiting trial.

According to Rivera, legal efforts on Correa’s behalf “blew up” when journalist Carlos Vera described it on two social media sites in July 2023, claiming a $100,000 bribe would be paid if it was successful. “Someone heard about the plan, obviously, and leaked the details to him (Vera),” Rivera testified. “At that point, the plan was dropped.”

Rivera said he was not aware that Correa personally knew about the attempt.

In a statement to prosecutors after his arrest, Rivera described an elaborate plan to overturn Correa’s convictions and allow him to return to the country. The statement said the plan was engineered by Terán and involved discrediting and firing Attorney General Diana Salazar.