PIP condemns Department of Justice for not prosecuting FBI

PIP condemns Department of Justice for not prosecuting FBI
April 10, 2008
Press Release
http://www.independencia.net/noticias2/comp_jd_censura%20DJnoFBI10abr08.html

San Juan, Puerto Rico - The Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP) reacted today through its secretary general, attorney Juan Dalmau Ramírez, to the announcement of the Department of Justice of Puerto Rico that it was dismissing and closing the case of the FBI’s assassination of Filiberto Ojeda Ríos. Dalmau Ramírez expressed the following:

“The Attorney General abandoned his responsibility to defend the interests of the Puerto Rican people and became the defense attorney for the FBI and Luis Fraticelli in the face of criminal charges for the assassination of Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, all with the ratification and consent of governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá.

The Department of Justice’s own report documents indisputable evidence of facts that indicate criminal acts by the FBI. However, Acevedo Vilá’s administration decided to close the investigation and not charge those responsible for the assassination of Filiberto Ojeda.

In the first place, it is an indisputable fact that the FBI agent who assassinated Filiberto Ojeda did not shoot in self defense, contrary to what he told the Inspector General of the federal Department of Justice. As an issue of fact, the Puerto Rico Department of Justice’s own report indicates that “when agent ‘Bryan’ (a pseudonym) fired the shots that caused the death of Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, they denote an intentional and deliberate course of action.”

Once the Institute of Forensic Sciences scientifically proved that the FBI agent’s shooting of Filiberto was not in self defense and that his conduct was intentional and deliberate, the only conclusion is that we are talking about an assassination. In the face of this evidence, the Acevedo Vilá administration preferred not to prosecute.

Second, the report gives the lie to the theory that the excessive use of force and weapons was necessary to create an element of surprise and to arrest Filiberto Ojeda. The very information offered by the FBI to the Inspector General of the federal Department of Justice and the information complied by the Puerto Rico Department of Justice reveals that hours before the execution of the operation, the FBI was about 300 meters from the entrance to the farm where Filiberto Ojeda was found. They had blockaded the highways with agents identified with FBI initials on their clothing, which publicized their presence. However, they allowed the owner of the property where Filiberto Ojeda was– who the FBI identified as one of his collaborators– to enter. Thus, far from acting with urgency to create an element of surprise, the FBI created the conditions so that Filiberto Ojeda would be notified and aware of the operation, and thus generate a confrontation which would justify their assassinating him, which they had planned to do from the beginning.

Third, the Department of Justice used information from the Inspector General of the federal Department of Justice that agent “Bryan” heard Filiberto Ojeda moaning after he shot him. He heard when he fell to the ground, and agents heard sounds that gave the impression that he was drowning. Nevertheless, they left him spread on the floor, bleeding to death, without entering the residence to prevent his death. In the face of this evidence, the Attorney General posits that because he was going to die anyway, there is no point in holding the federal agents responsible.

These three facts are indisputable, and nevertheless, for each one which denotes criminal conduct on the part of the FBI, the Department of Justice presents defenses or justifications that the FBI could raise in order to have acted as they did, and thus wash their hands and not prosecute the FBI in Puerto Rico, neither Luis Fraticelli nor the agents who participated in the operation.

Once again, the leadership of the Popular Party and its government functionaries manipulated the sensibilities of our people, particularly independentist sectors, to create the false impression that the government would take offensive action in the face of the assassination of Filiberto Ojeda. Having the evidence and information involving participants of an event that could be called criminal, they wash their hands and justify their failure to act using legal technicalities.

A dignified response on the part of the government would have been to make appropriate charges against the Head of the FBI and the agents who participated.”