A day after the US introduced it took the uncommon step of shuttering it’s Drug Enforcement Administration office in the Dominican Republic — a key web site in the company’s effort to fight drug trafficking in the Caribbean — a prime agent there was charged with operating a visa fraud scheme.
US Ambassador Leah F. Campos introduced on social media Thursday that she had closed the DEA’s office, writing “It is a disgusting and disgraceful violation of public trust to use one’s official capacity for personal gain.”
“I will not tolerate even the perception of corruption anywhere in the Embassy I lead,” Campos added.
The Justice Department introduced Friday the expenses towards supervisory particular agent Meliton Cordero, who the DOJ mentioned in a press launch was assigned to the US Embassy in the Dominican Republic for six years. Cordero was arrested Thursday.
Cordero is charged with conspiracy to commit bribery and visa fraud, in line with the Justice Department. Prosecutors didn’t ask that he be detained, however he was ordered to give up his passport.
Prosecutors say Cordero accepted hundreds of {dollars} in alternate for aiding international nationals with securing nonimmigrant visas that might enable them to go to the US for a brief interval.
“During his assignment at the U.S. Embassy in the Dominican Republic, Cordero expedited at least 119 visa applications, at least one of which is alleged to have been fraudulent, often coaching individuals in preparation for their visa interview with U.S. Consular Officers,” the Justice Department mentioned.
Charging paperwork towards Cordero haven’t but been unsealed in courtroom information.
The US ambassador made the extraordinary transfer to close down the DEA’s office in the Dominican Republic in current days, in response to the corruption probe,
The choice may hamper US anti-narcotics efforts in the area, which the Trump administration has cited as a excessive precedence.
The office is a serious base of operations for monitoring and reducing off traffickers utilizing the Caribbean as a path to site visitors cocaine from South America to Europe and the US.
The Dominican authorities has allowed the Defense Department to make use of its army services as a part of a broader effort that features army strikes on purported trafficking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean.
“The temporary closure of the DEA office in Santo Domingo is to allow time for an investigation internal to this Embassy. The Dominican Republic remains a critical partner in our work to combat narco-terrorism throughout the region,” the US embassy in the Dominican Republic mentioned in a press release on X. “That work will continue at the same robust pace between the U.S. Embassy in Santo Domingo and our Dominican partners even as our internal investigation ensues.”