Reforma, Mexico City, November 26, 2022
Yesterday, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador ordered the Secretary of Security and Citizen Protection (SSPC) to disobey the mandates of the judges when the intent is to release criminals as a "holiday".
In his daily morning press conference, the President instructed the officials to refuse to abide by the decisions of the judges and asked them to respond in writing to the release orders, arguing that they have "other information" about the charges or processes against the defendants and thus prevent them from leaving prison.
"I have already told them in the Ministry of Public Security that, if [the person is charged with] clearly an act of corruption, that they hold them, that they send a letter to the judge, saying: I can't [release them], because I have other information, and that they continue to hold them!" !" he blurted out.
However, legal specialists are of the opinion that AMLO's call is, in itself, criminal conduct that undermines the autonomy of the Judiciary. Jorge Lara, former Legal Deputy Attorney of the extinct PGR, said,
"What the President expressed places him in the position of possible commission of various types of crimes against the administration of justice, as contemplated in article 225 of the Federal Penal Code."
He also explained that officials who heed the presidential call risk being prosecuted and removed from office.
Estefanía Medina, who was the director for the implementation of the Accusatory Penal System in the General Inspectorate of the PGR, pointed out that the defense of a crime is a legal category that would be applicable to the President's order. She also described his statement as self-contradictory.
The presidential directive was announced in response to the Supreme Court's annulment of the 2019 reform of criminal law which imposed mandatory preventive detention for people accused of certain tax crimes, including the issuance of tax receipts for non-existent activities...
MV Note: Preventative detention is the imprisonment of a person when it is suspected they may have committed a crime but police and prosecutors do not have sufficient evidence to merit an indictment. International law considers it a violation of civil liberties and the Mexican Supreme Court has so ruled.
For their part, deputies from the opposition parties charged that the instruction violates the rule of law, human rights, the Constitution, the Judiciary and the separation of powers.