(QCOSTARICA) Panama’s Supreme Court dismissed a judge who set four Costa Ricans free after being arrested with 500 kilos of cocaine.
La Prensa in Panama reports the Full Court “decided to annul” the interim appointment of Mixila Alicia Méndez Sánchez as judge of Garantías en el Circuito Judicial de Chiriquí (west).
The decision was made after Mendez decided not to order preventive detention (jail) for the four Costa Ricans arrested on September 22 on the high seas in a boat with a double bottom where authorities found the half ton of cocaine.
In a hearing on September 25, the judge instead ordered the four to sign in weekly at the courthouse and not to leave the country.
This, “without assigning to police custody or ensure that they were registered with the National Migration Service, knowing that (those involved) have no roots in the country,” said the Supreme Court statement.
The prosecutor’s office filed an appeal, but the four Ticos did not appear at September 27 hearing and their whereabouts are now unknown.
