PRIMAVERA CASE: COURT LINKS FAKE MOTHER TO PROCEEDINGS

Guatemala, April 16, 2012. The Fourth Court of the First Instance for Criminal Matters, Drug Trafficking and Crimes against the Environment ruled to link Sandra Noemí Maldonado Velásquez de Chajón to proceedings for her alleged participation in the illegal adoption of the child Angely Liseth Hernandez Rodriguez in the Primavera case. Maldonado Velásquez is accused of human trafficking, criminal association, alteration and omission of marital status, misuse of marital status, misrepresentation and the use of fake documents. Sandra Noemí Maldonado was remanded in custody.

On April 12, 2012, National Civil Police officers—accompanied by officials of the Public Prosecutor's Office (MP) and CICIG—arrested Maldonado Velásquez in Zone 18 of the capital for her alleged involvement in the aforementioned case in which she is accused of assuming a false identity (that of Felícita López García) to facilitate the illegal adoption of the girl Angely Liseth Hernández Rodríguez. Maldonado passed as the mother of the girl, who had also been falsely identified as Karen Abigail López García.

The child Angely Hernández was taken on November 3, 2006 from the patio of her house, located in the municipality of San Miguel Petapa in the department of Guatemala City. She was then handed over with false papers to an adoptive family from outside of Guatemala by the Asociación Primavera.

CICIG acts as a complementary prosecutor in this criminal proceeding. Other parties are also involved in the case.