Ecuador: Arrest of 3 top police officers charged with attempt to kill President Correa

[Peace Patriot]

Senior police held in Ecuador plot to kill president

By Valeria Pacheco (AFP) – 1 day ago

QUITO — Soldiers were on patrol in Ecuador's main cities Saturday following the arrest of three senior police officers charged with attempting to kill President Rafael Correa during a police mutiny.

The officers, all police colonels, were arrested Friday for their role in the gunfire and street clashes Thursday that that killed eight people and left 274 wounded, the prosecutor's office told AFP.

(SNIP)

Officials did not name the three detained police colonels, but local media identified them as Manuel Rivadeneira, Julio Cesar Cueva and Marcelo Echeverria.

In a television interview late Friday, Correa blamed supporters of Lucio Gutierrez -- an ex-army colonel who was president 2003-2005 -- for the chaos, and said the mutinous police wanted to kill him.

"Their strategy to destabilize the government failed, so Plan B was to assassinate the president," Correa said.

"One of the police officers killed, a sergeant, was in my escort. The bullet was aimed at me," Correa said.

(MORE)

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gkNFARieUmr6YaSVzSoAD5I_V7Gg?docId=CNG.c4626460d3a071fc9cade9d78267e7e2.71
(my emphases)

[EFerrari]

1. Come on! Plots to kill the president are not an attempted coup.

It's just a form of collective bargaining! :sarcasm:

I stuck this story in rabs "more than a coup thread". No flies on Correa. Despite everything he's been through, his government is dealing with this apace.

[Peace Patriot]

2. Ecuador police commander: "We're going to make him pay for what he did to the police."

Interview of Colombian Jorge Rojas, a Catholic human rights worker who is in Ecuador to help with the huge humanitarian problem of refugees from Colombia. (There are approximately 5 MILLION displaced people in Colombia, mostly poor farmers, hundreds of thousands of whom have fled into neighboring Ecuador and Venezuela, mostly the result of U.S.-funded state terror by the Colombian military and its closely tied rightwing death squads.)

Rojas was near the hospital while President Correa was in captivity there, and also overheard a group of police officers outside the National Assembly (which they were blockading). Here's that bit:

---

(SNIP)

Q: You mentioned that you heard instructions given among the police. Can you tell me about that?

A: When I was in the National Assembly (the legislature), I went up close to a group of police who were receiving guidelines from a colonel or general, I couldn't tell which. This officer told the police not to talk in terms of "kidnapping the president," because that could cause problems for them. He said they should say the president was being "protected by the police in the hospital."

And in the same breath, the officer said: "But we're not letting him leave. And he's going to pay for what he's done to the police." That's what I heard.

Q: You were in the legislature at the time?

A: No, not inside -- I was outside. The National Assembly has been taken over by the police. And the police who were receiving this order, these instructions, were throwing up barricades at the entrance and around the legislature, and burning tires.

(MORE)
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53024
(my emphasis)

-------

Granted, it's only hearsay. But it fits with much else we've heard, about what went down at the hospital--for instance, that the president was in fact detained. Some stupids are still trying to claim otherwise, even though--while Correa was finally being rescued by the military--police shooters shot and killed one of Correa's guards, shot up his car, shot up other cars accompanying it and had sharpshooters on roofs shooting at the military.

I don't know if this police colonel or general said, "He's going to pay for what he's done to the police," because he believed the propaganda about the bonuses, or because he's just revving up his troops (he wants them to believe it). But when they started shooting, the goals of the commanders of this coup plot and those of ordinary police personnel or the few soldiers involved diverge, revealing an organized plot to overthrow the government. You don't try to kill the president and kill others--and coordinate shutting down 3 airports and the legislature, etc.---over bonuses!

That's todays rightwing (and CIA and corpo-fascist press) "talking point"--that it wasn't a coup attempt!

Rojas says: "...this isn't just a problem of demands by the police. This, it seems, was very well planned. So well planned that the airports were taken over by a sector of the air force which, undoubtedly, has to do with the coup. Because there was no reason to suspend the flights at all of the country's airports."

[Judi Lynn]

3. Also, as Rabs pointed out overnight, if that car hadn't been bulletproofed, he'd be history now!

There's a bullet hole right in the window where he was sitting in the passenger's seat in the front. They would have nailed him if they hadn't brought a vehicle which had been bullet proofed for him. Other photos show bullet holes in it from the front to the back end. He would have been toast. They intended to murder him. So glad they were thwarted.

[flamingdem]

9. Now that's a story NEVER discussed in Main Stream Media

I didn't realize that 5 million had fled, should read more posts here!

The wannabe coupsters were inspired by Honduras, sin duda.

[Judi Lynn]

14. It's the 2nd worst humanitarian crisis in the world, right after Sudan. n/t

[Billy Burnett]

4. Very strange manipulations.

The police were getting more money than ever. But yet ...

[rabs]

5. Judge has released the three colonels

but they still face charges. Release is conditional.

-- they were charged on Friday with attempting to assassinate Correa.
-- judge upheld criminal charges against them.
-- government had asked for preventive detainment but judge imposed other measures.
-- the accused have to appear before the judge each 15 days.
-- they are prohibited from leaving the country or disposing of any personal property.
-- charges against them remain, including attempted magnicide against Correa.
-- at their hearing today, the colonels denied any participation in the insurrection.
-- they said they had been unable to "control their personnel."
--------------------
Juez liberó a coroneles detenidos por rebelión
QUITO, AFP
Un juez ecuatoriano dejó en libertad este sábado a tres coroneles que habían sido detenidos la víspera acusados de tentativa de asesinato contra el presidente Rafael Correa durante una rebelión policial, pero mantuvo los cargos criminales en su contra, informó una fuente judicial.

La Fiscalía había dictado la prisión preventiva contra los oficiales, pero el juez la sustituyó por otras medidas alternativas durante una audiencia de formulación de cargos en Quito, dijo a periodistas el fiscal del caso, Marco Freire.

Los imputados deberán presentarse cada 15 días ante el juez y quedaron con prohibición de salir del país y enajenar bienes, agregó el fiscal distrital de la provincia de Pichincha, cuya capital es Quito.

Sin embargo, la instrucción contra ellos sigue, al igual que los cargos, incluido el de intento de magnicidio contra Correa, que denunció la sublevación del pasado jueves como una tentativa de golpe de Estado y de asesinato.

Durante la audiencia, los coroneles deslindaron su responsabilidad en la insurrección, señalando que “no pudieron controlar al personal”, que pedía derogar una ley que asegura afectará sus prestaciones, comentó el fiscal.

La detención de los coroneles se produjo el viernes por orden de la Fiscalía, que no descartó que otros mandos sean arrestados bajo acusaciones de intento de asesinato y por atentar contra la seguridad del Estado.

----------------------

In another development, six top generals in the national police have been cashiered.

6 generales fuera de la cúpula de la Policía
Redacción Judicial
[e-mail]

Patricio Franco es el nuevo comandante de la Policía. Esa fue la primera secuela de la insubordinación policial del jueves. Ayer, Freddy Martínez dimitió al cargo y, tras su salida, el Gobierno dejó fuera del Mando policial a otros cinco generales: Florencio Ruiz (ex jefe de Estado Mayor), Euclides Mantilla (ex inspector general), Jaime Vaca (ex director de Operaciones), Oswaldo Yépez y Carlos Arcos.

[Peace Patriot]

6. They're charged with trying to kill the President but the judge let them loose?

This seems astonishingly wrong from any angle that you look at it. It zoomed me back to 1963. Charged presidential assassins first of all need protection. Then it zoomed me forward to the Patriot Act-Homeland-Security-"war on terra"-U.S. worldwide assassination teams era. Am I too used to this dreadful U.S. age that we are living through? You don't let charged assassins run around free! And, on the other hand, mass murderers, war criminals, torturers are running around free, raking in speaker's fees, publishing books, teaching students, pontificating on TV, snorting cocaine, doing whatever they do, immune from all consequences.

Am I just being a "war on terra" propagandized American, to think that, um, charged presidential assassins are an exception to the rule of "presumed innocent" (no bail--they need to be in custody), because of the gravity of the crime--just like somebody found with a "dirty bomb" in his basement would need to be in custody? The RISK of letting them out on bail is too great. Not to mention the flight risk, and the risk that their handlers or associates, will kill them.

I know that Ecuador is a more democratic country than our own, but still...

Did the judge not take these charges seriously?

Is the judge a rightwinger who doesn't care if a leftist president was nearly killed?

Is the judge in on an escape plot? (--happened in Colombia, but Ecuador?)

Was the judge thinking that the police establishment is unreliable for custody of these charged assassins? (I would certainly worry about that, if I was the judge.)

WHAT? I don't understand this ruling.

Ecuador has a porous border with Colombia (and the border has been reopened). If these charged assassins are part of a larger criminal enterprise--not unthinkably originating in Colombia and/or Washington, but even with mere local fascist connections--they're gone.

Is there something that I am not understanding here, rabs? Something cultural? Something legal? About Ecuador?

[Downwinder]

8. We all know that Police Officers are eminently trustworthy and their

statements are to be taken as Gospel. And Generals are not to be questioned in any way. All in all, not too surprising.

After all, a President is a Politician and everybody knows how reliable they are.

[rabs]

10. Cannot answer questions you pose at this moment

Is there something that I am not understanding here, rabs? Something cultural? Something legal? About Ecuador?

--------------------

Just got in and will be scouring the Ecuadoran media and blogs to see if can find the legal basis for their release.

So far the argument for the retired National Police Commander Freddy Martinez and the three colonels is that they could not control rogue police who participated in the attempted coup/assassination insurrection.

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Correa was taken out of hospital where he was held hostage in a wheel chair. He could not walk because of an injury to his operated knee. Correa said a police officer in the mob scene outside the hospital has taken a swing at his leg with a rifle butt, but an aide stepped in front of him and took the blow. The aide suffered a broken ankle, according to Correa.

Meantime, recommend watching these videos posted by the opposition newspaper El Comercio of Quito. The videos show just how dangerous the situation was, gunshots are clearly audible.

http://www.elcomercio.com/web/noticias/Home.html

Videos show what appears to be Correa being taken to his vehicle under heavy gunfire from snipers. Motorcycle cop who was to escort Correa's convoy shown on pavement (Correa had said one of the escorts cops had been killed by a sniper, so this may be the one.)

There is also footage of the mob scene outside the police headquarters where Correa was accosted. You can clearly see when the tear-gas grenade exploded near his head.

Another shows the police in side the hospital who were protecting Correa coming under rifle fire from their rogue comrades outside.

Another shows the National Police commander resigning -- saying only a few hundred of the more than 40,000 National Police took part in the insurrection.

There is more, pro-Correa supporters being repressed etc.

[Peace Patriot]

11. Thanks for the new info!

I've seen some of the vids you mention--the one of the rioters when Correa was tear gassed. I did see, on first viewing, one of the two men who reached over his body guards and tried to rip his gas mask off. (I later saw the other one in the still photos.) It was too far away to see the thug swing at his recently operated on leg with a rifle butt--but that explains why he was limping a bit later. That is really, really foul play--to hit a man just out of the hospital for a knee operation on his injured knee. How despicable can you get!

I've also seen the one of the police at a hospital exit, but I didn't know who they were. I take it that they were the loyal police guarding President Correa's removal from the hospital. Other police (disloyal police?) were repeatedly shooting at them from outside. When I first saw this, I thought that the army was trying to get in--and were shooting and trying to break down the door. But I gather that this was the opposite situation. Those shooting and ramming the door were trying to get AT President Correa to harm him further. And, if I understand this vid now, the loyal police were holding their position against invasion and under fire, then they surround Correa as (something we can't see) he is moved in a wheelchair (because he can't walk) to the exit, where he is put into a bulletproof vehicle (thank God) which was shot up, as were accompanying vehicles, as they left.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Yes, this was a far more perilous situation than seemed to be the case on first reports. As we have learned more, the peril that President Correa was in has grown exponentially. If his brave and fast-thinking body guards hadn't gotten him into the hospital, and then if those loyal police hadn't held their position, it's pretty plain that Correa would have been killed, or injured even more badly. One thing that struck me about the tear gas mask assaulter that I initially picked out (also true of the second one) is that they were standing very still and calm in the midst of a chaotic riot situation, just watching Correa, then, when they had an opening, assaulted him. My suspicion is that these were not protesting or rioting policemen; they were trained operatives--trained not to be distracted by the chaos, trained to focus on their target; trained to look for openings in situations like this. These were not random angry people (as the one who hit his knee might have been). Their actions seemed very planned and deliberate. As to that--planning--the coup designers could not have anticipated Correa's courageous action of going to the barracks to talk to the protesting policemen. I suspect that that is why he was not killed, then and there, in the riot. It's possible that the two coup operatives that were trying to grab his tear gas mask (one with a black bandana on on his face, the other wearing a police riot helmet) were taken by surprise (Correa showing up there) and couldn't get a clear shot at him because Correa's bodyguards stayed close to him, and shoved these operatives away. They would have been taken down immediately if they had raised a weapon, and they were not close enough (body guards in between) for a knifing.

One reason that I suspect all this--coup operatives among the protesting police--is the later heavy duty shooting at the hospital, trying to break into the hospital and eventually killing one of the Correa's body guards as he left the hospital. The intent of this coup was murder. Correa has said a couple of things that corroborate this. He said that the initial intent was to destabilize the government, and when that started falling apart (largely because the military stayed loyal to the government), the intent became assassination. But who switched the goals? Somebody or group must have been in command to keep the rioting and chaos focused. I simply don't believe that ordinary policemen would act this way--besiege a hospital (a hospital!) to shoot the wounded president of the country over BONUSES.

It doesn't make sense, unless the disinformation campaign that got them riled up, and their subsequent actions, were being directed. Of course, the shutdown of 3 airports and all the rest was already pointing to an organized, planned coup.

What this means is that the three charged police officers may be lying--and the resigned police chief possibly also--about not being in control of their policemen. But they all may be innocent and someone else was directing things. This could be why the judge released the three charged colonels and trusted them to remain in the country--that he feels that the real charge against them is loss of control not perpetration. But if not them, who? WHO was giving the commands--at the airports, at road blockades, in other barracks, in 2 or 3 cities, and at the Quito barracks and at the hospital--also out in the streets, tear gassing and shooting at ordinary citizens? These clearly were a SIGNALED series of events. Apart from the tear gas riot that Correa got caught in, there was little that seems spontaneous about this whole event, and much that seems coordinated and commanded.

Those two still figures in the midst of the tear gas riot, watching Correa, and then trying to move in on him, point to long term planning--having operatives in place amidst the police to take opportunistic action.

[rabs]

12. Here is what I found tonight on the three colonels

But first there is a story tonight that weapons are being taken away from police who have been identified, according to interior minister, who said "they no longer have any right to them."

Video footage from several TV Quito stations has been confiscated to identify as many mutineers as possible and file charges against them.

------------------------

From opposition newspaper El Comercio (which incidentally is reporting that Correa's vehicle did NOT :shrug: have any bullet impacts).

-- A colonel Erwin E. testified before the judge that it was Correa's speech ("kill me, here I am") that provoked the police gathered below to agression.

--"The police did not like how he treated them. The president showed his chest and said "kill me. The police respected him and did not do it."

-- In the midst of the disorder, the colonel said "he and Gen. Euclides Mantilla tried to evacuate the president. We stopped a pickup that was at the heliport and his security took him to the Police Hospital."

--The colonel said they protected Foreign Minister Patino and a congressman who arrived at the scene from rocks thrown at them. "Now the attorney general says that we wanted to kill the president."

-- Patricia Campues, attorney for Col. José R., said, "The colonels did not have access to the patrol cars (used by the mutineers) or the motorcycle cops. Much less to the weapons in the police regiment."

-- After hearing the arguments on both sides, Judge Héctor Coba said he found no foundation to order preventive prison for the three colonels and ordered their release.

-----------------------

It still leaves all your doubts dangling. Is the judge anti-Correa? Are the colonels lying?
Was the government accusations against the colonels too weak? There is still much confusion and since it was a weekend, not much has filtered out about the investigations.

One last point; Lucio Gutierrez was reported by his brother to have been in Brazil as an "observer" of today's elections. But there has not been a single mention of him in the Brazilian media that I have seen. El Commercio also has been mum on Gutierrez's whereabouts, as has the Correa government.

The picture of who was involved (apart from the low-level policemen) should start to filter out in the next few days.

[Judi Lynn]

15. That's something we won't be hearing from our craptacular corporate media.

I have been thinking for days about the wierd timing, with them going after him at a time they knew he is disabled, and will be for a while, completely unable to run at all. It was well publicized he was going in for that knee operation last week.

Sure hope he has some way of locating the bastard who took a shot at his leg with his rifle butt. He can be charged with attempted assault on the President and very serious assault charges on the aide. If you hear anything about it if the cop is located, and you remember, would you let us know?

Sure hope he gets to discover his name to "thank" him personally.

[EFerrari]

7. Cleaning house seems like a good move but it is also a dangerous one.

Six new people in those jobs at the same time and who knows what moles who may decide to act before they are also despedidos.

A very delicate time for Ecuador.

[Judi Lynn]

16. All this on top of the Air Force insiders who were working with Colombia and the U.S.

prior to that bombing attack near the border.

I'll bet the loyal ones have no idea of whom they can trust in the police departments.

[rabs]

13. Law calls for allocating 320 million dollars to modernize National Police

X-posting from Ecuador thread in LBN


Spotted this story in Spanish last night. It details what the new law will do to help the rank-and-file police. I have not seen any English-language MSM publish this. (caps, translation mine)


This paragraph is especially relevant:

El Plan Estratégico contempla la racionalización de los pases en procura de que los uniformados permanecen en sus lugares de origen, un sistema justo de remuneraciones y la modernización de los servicios sociales en beneficio del personal policial.

-- The Strategic Plan contemplates ... transfers so that the (police) can stay in the places of origin, A JUST SYSTEM OF SALARIES, and modernization of social services to benefit police personnel.

-----------------------

http://andes.info.ec/actualidad/320-millones-asigno-el-...

----------------

ah ha, the Spanish story has a translation function at the bottom.

$ 320 million allocated by the Government to the logistical and technological upgrading of the Police
by ALPS / AR '15:34 - October 2, 2010

QUITO.- Ensure the provision of financial resources, logistics and technology for the National Police to carry out its mission of protecting citizens in the fight against crime, contemplates the Strategic Plan for the Modernization and Integral Transformation (2010-2014).

The Government allocated $ 320 million, according to Interior Ministry data. In 2007, 114 policemen were killed by lack of protection. And, only 9,000 of the 38,000 soldiers had bulletproof vests operational and had only 19,000 weapons, according difudió official newspaper The Citizen.

After three years, the Government has delivered 30,610 pistols, 27,022 bulletproof vests, 30,610 Glock pistols, 2,035 motorcycles and 70 Cuadrón. Also included vehicles, helmets, shields and communication equipment.

"While crime is organized and technologically advanced ... the police had neither the most basic tools of defense, but now the situation is different and this allows us to counteract the insecurity," said Interior Minister Gustavo Jalkh.

Besides investing in equipment and infrastructure (40 Mobile Units Citizen, 1,461 patrols and 6 mobile units of Criminology), the Government allocated $ 10 million FOR A PROJECT OF 2,500 (housing) UNITS FOR THE POLICE.

------------------
The new law stipulates the $320 million would be allocated between 2010 and 2014.

[Judi Lynn]

17. Sociopathic stupid people can be easily mobilized by emotional ploys.

They jumped to conclusions they will find out later were wildly off base.

People like that never seem to learn, even when they've done despicable things in their ignorance.

[EFerrari]

18. See, *this* is what I meant about professionalizing the national police

in order to make them less vulnerable to "the American Embassy".

*THAT* is what this has really been about, imho. Not simply a labor dispute, not simply a coup attempt, but a wrestling match between Ecuador and La CIA for the security forces.