Q COSTA RICA — The man who for years topped Costa Rica’s most wanted list, Alejandro Arias Monge, alias “Diablo”, will face various precautionary measures in several court cases following his capture last Friday.
On Monday, the Tribunal Penal de Pococí (Pococí Criminal Court), in the precautionary hearing held for security reasons in the First Judicial Circuit of San José, ordered three months and 22 days of preventive detention against Arias Monge as part of the criminal process he faces for a case related to two homicides, an attempted homicide and the alleged crime of illicit association.
In the same hearing, the court imposed five months and 26 days of pretrial detention on Jonathan Pérez Méndez, alias “Tan,” who is listed as a co-defendant in the same case.
This precautionary measure is the initial one: given that both suspects appear in multiple investigations, this case is the one in which the Prosecutor’s Office had the most guaranteed to obtain the imposition of imprisonment, as the legal battle now begins in the other cases, in which the prosecution will also request precautionary measures.
Furthermore, this case has been transferred to the organized crime jurisdiction, a special judicial body that allows suspects to be held in custody for longer periods and has greater resources to prosecute leaders of organized crime groups.
On Tuesday, Costa Rica’s Attorney General, Carlo Díaz, revealed that Arias Monge met with two U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents in a meeting that took place on Monday at the San José Courts and that its purpose was to inform the alleged drug trafficker about the United States’ interest in requesting his extradition and to explore his willingness to cooperate.
This also explains why Arias Monge was transferred from La Reforma prison early Monday morning for a 1:30 p.m. court hearing, a move by the Judiciary heavily criticized by President Laura Fernández and Minister Rodrigo Chaves during their attendance at the Legislative Assembly.
Díaz confirmed that in Monday’s process, Arias Monge had held a meeting with the two DEA agents and stated that he did not understand the concern expressed by government officials.
“What are they afraid of?” responded publicly the Attorney General to government criticism over Diablo’s transfer.
He also clarified that only U.S. agents and the accused himself were present at the meeting, in accordance with established protocols for this type of proceeding.
According to Díaz, the main objective of the conversation was to inform Arias Monge of the interest of the US authorities in promoting a possible extradition process for alleged crimes related to international drug trafficking and to find out what his position would be in that scenario.
The Attorney General clarified that the meeting was completely private and that no official from the Attorney General’s Office or any other Costa Rican institution participated in the conversation.
“I don’t know what they discussed. I wasn’t at that meeting, and neither were any other Costa Rican officials. Only DEA agents were there,” he stated.
Although the DEA has not yet submitted a formal extradition request for Arias Monge, this approach demonstrates that U.S. authorities have already begun proceedings related to the case.
Díaz recalled that the DEA followed a similar procedure with Celso Gamboa and Edwin López Vega, who were later indicted by U.S. authorities for alleged crimes related to international drug trafficking and extradited to the U.S. earlier this year.