Naming The One Not Named

Rene Maradiaga Panchamé is the name I think you're looking for, the one omitted from the press reports from Honduras about a Honduran National Police commander who carried out the hit on the Honduran Drug Czar.

Yesterday the Honduran paper, El Heraldo, released a story and photos of an investigative report internal to the National Police in Honduras that names "El Señor Director de Servicios Especiales de Investigacion, Commissionado General " as the organizer of the assassination plot that killed then Honduran Drug Czar General Julián Arístides González Irias on the 8th of December, 2009.  Then security Minister Oscar Alvarez claims to have never seen this investigative report.  The then head of the National Police, Jose Luis Muñoz Licona, made a similar claim.  The last date stamped on the report itself is 2010 when it was received by the Inspector General of the National Police.

That blanked out name appears to belong to René Maradiaga Panchamé, who was listed in multiple contemporary press reports as the Director of Special Investigations of the Police (here, here, for example) in late 2009.

This is not entirely a surprise.

René Maradiaga Panchamé was a former member of Battalion 316, the notorious intelligence group that disppeared more than 300 Hondurans in the 1980s.  Battalion 316 was founded in 1979 by General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, himself trained at the School of the Americas and in Argentina.

The Interamerican Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) published a report in 2002 called "Los Hechos hablan por si mismos:  informe preliminar sobre los desaparacidos en Honduras 1980-1993".  In it, on page 474, a declassified Honduran military document from the Commander of the Armed Forces, announces the appointment of the command structure for Battalion 316 for 1987.  Maradiaga Panchame was appointed to the battalion with the title "Jefe de Equipo Movil No. I".

This was the time of Iran-Contra scandal during the Regan presidency, when the CIA was funneling arms to the Contras to fight the Sandanistas and using cocaine and other illegal trade to fund the operations.  Maradiaga Panchame was joined at this time, by Napoleon Nazar Herrera, who was named "Jefe, Secretaria de Apoyo y Servicio" of the unit, whose name appears in the same list naming Maradiaga Panchame a member.  Here he would have become familiar with, and maybe involved in the drug trade between Nicaragua and Honduras which originated from the CIA program to finance and arm the Contras in Honduras.

In December, 2009, after the coup, he was appointed by coup leader Roberto Micheletti Bain, along with many of his Battalion 316 co-workers to command positions within the National Police. 

In October of 2012, Panchame Maradiaga, and Salomon Escoto Salinas were two of the more than 99 high ranking police commanders who were put on leave, paid but with no assignment.  They failed one or more of the confidence tests being used to weed out corrupt officers.  Others, like Luis Muñoz Licona and Ricardo Ramon del Cid were suspended.  These last two were in charge of the police when Alfredo Landaverde was murdered in Tegucigalpa in December 2011, and recent news accounts in Honduras suggest they organized his murder.  They were also in charge when the University Rector, Julietta Castellanos's son and another university student were murdered by the National Police.  The same two commanders were suspended because they protected the perpetrators of the murder and allowed them to escape from custody.

We know that by 2012 Maradiaga Panchamé was publicly reported as leader of Los Magnificos, a drug operation bringing drugs through Honduras from Nicaragua while still a member of the National Police.  We believe that today Los Magnificos would be operating as part of the Zetas cartel.  His drug trafficking contact was "Chepe" Luna (Jose Natividad Luna Pereira), a well known trafficker who worked the southern Honduran drug routes across Choluteca, with whom Maradiaga Panchamé was good friends. Luna ran Los Perrones, a transportista drug gang in El Salvador.
 
In 2013 the Tribunal Superior de Cuentas found that Maradiaga Panchamé had wealth that he could not account for.  It made a similar finding for his fellow Police Commander and former Battalion 316 member Napoleon Nazar Herrera.

2014 is an interesting year.   In January, Maradiaga Panchamé was one of many of the high ranking police commanders who resigned unexpectedly, and before they had completed the normal 35 years of service.  In May it appeared as if he had been arrested and released, but he told the Honduran press that he'd just been in Police headquarters doing business as part of the Police Hospital program.  On June 25, 2014 Chepe Luna was assassinated in Comayaguela.

So this is the name you're not allowed to know in Honduras, René Maradiaga Panchamé, because it might endanger the non-existent investigation.

What Makes a Good Chief of Police?

Honduras' president, Porfirio Lobo Sosa, isn't saying. At least not in words.

But we now have plenty of actions on which to reach some conclusions about his criteria.

Way back in October 2011, Lobo Sosa bid goodbye to then-chief José Luis Muñoz Licona after the four police officers suspected of killing a group of university students (including the son of Julieta Castellanos) went missing. His minister of security, Pompeyo Bonilla, reshuffled all the top security officers, bringing us Ricardo Ramírez del Cid.

Then just a little over a week ago, Lobo Sosa-- newly returned from consultation in the US with unnamed representatives of the US government-- removed Ramírez del Cid, replacing him with Juan Carlos "el Tigre" Bonilla Valladares.

The apparent pressure for the change came from the recent murder of prominent radio broadcaster (on the national HRN) Alfredo Villatoro, whose body was recovered dressed in a police uniform. Villatoro's death brings to 24 the number of Honduran journalists killed since the 2009 coup.

Press reports yesterday say that, unlike the preceding 23 cases-- including the immediately preceding, and still under-reported death of LGBT and Libre party primary candidate Erick Martinez Avila-- there have now been already multiple arrests in the Villatoro case. At least one of those arrested is reputed to be a police officer.

So it seems like Lobo Sosa finally has what he wants in a police chief: someone who gets results quickly.

Which should give everyone pause. Bonilla Valladares definitely has a history of getting results. But that history shows that the "results" came from his exercise of extra-judicial power.

New coverage by the AP has explored this history, which led to Bonilla being tried for a 2002 murder. As the AP article correctly notes, he was acquitted in 2004, a decision that was ultimately reaffirmed by the Honduran Supreme Court in 2009. But being acquitted is not the same thing as being innocent. In Honduras, the rule of law fails because the entire system is corrupt: original evidence is not collected, contaminated, or lost, investigators are prevented from completing their work or are threatened if they do so honestly, evidence is lost, witnesses flee or die.

The victims in the cases where Bonilla was accused of involvement were young men, targets of murder in Honduras under the ideology of mano dura for their known or suspected involvement in gangs.

The AP story includes crucial information from Maria Luisa Borjas, the head of internal affairs in the Honduran police who was charged with investigating that case, and who was suspended when she went public with complaints about interference in her investigation.

An investigative story on a Salvadoran news site,  El Faro, published in August of 2011, gives a first-hand view of Bonilla Valladares, based on shadowing and interviewing him, that adds to the testimony of Borjas:

In 2002, the Internal Affairs Unit of the Police accused El Tigre [Bonilla Valladares] of participating in a death squad for supposed delinquents in San Pedro Sula... This included having a witness that said he had been present at one of the executions by this death squad formed, supposedly, by police and called "Los Magníficos". El Tigre had to pay a 100,000 lempiras (more than $5,000) bail for his liberty during the trial. Afterward, in proceedings that many paint as rigged, where the principal promoter of the denunciation, the ex-chief of the Internal Affairs unit [Borjas] was removed from her job in the middle of the case, Bonilla was exonerated.

—Have you killed anyone outside legal proceedings?-- I asked him, while we left behind El Paraíso.
—There are things that one carries to the grave. What I can say is that I love my country and I am disposed to defend it at any cost, and I have done things to defend it. That is all that I will say.

El Faro adds more from the statement by Borjas to Honduran media that got her suspended by then Minister of Security Oscar Alvarez. In those exchanges Borjas quoted Bonilla Valladares as saying

—If they want to send me to the courts as the sacrificial lamb this Police force is going to rumble, because I can tell the Minister of Security [Oscar Alvarez] to his face that I am the only one that complied with his instructions.

Oscar Alvarez, remember, was the author of mano dura in Honduras, the minister of security when the extrajudicial killing of young men became rampant, under whose watch such crimes were not prosecuted or prosecutions were interfered with so badly that the cases failed.

Lobo Sosa's solution for violence and police corruption in Honduras is a police chief with intimate experience with impunity, with a record of accusations of imposing his own view of morality through the use of force, and a self-righteous belief that what he does is good for the country.

Now we know what makes a good chief of police in the eyes of the Lobo Sosa administration.

And that seems to be just fine with the US government as well; the AP quotes Ambassador Lisa Kubiske as saying

"We definitely hope this change in leadership really leads to effective, lawful cleaning up of the police."

Which is, we are sure, exactly what she would say if a police officer who wouldn't deny having carried out extrajudicial executions were appointed to a jurisdiction in the US. As long as he was patriotic and willing to follow whatever orders his superior gave.

Police Shakeup

The head of the National Police, José Luis Muñoz Licona is out. Today the Secretary of Security, Pompeyo Bonilla, replaced him with José Ricardo Ramírez del Cid. There's no surprise here. Over the weekend, the four officers who are suspected of killing the two university students disappeared.

It came out over the weekend that the head of the Tegucigalpa Police, Jorge Alberto Barralaga Hernández, told them to take a few days off and report Sunday, releasing them from custody. Naturally, they disappeared. El Heraldo says they know that setting the police free was a "strategy" because they were innocent and the investigation had no physical evidence to tie them to the crime. When the four policemen failed to report Sunday, Barralaga Hernandez lost his job. Today the head of the National Police lost his job over the same issue.

In the meantime, four more policemen suspected of involvement in the killing were captured, and 300 FAL rifles and 300,000 cartridges for them disappeared from the Police Special forces (a.k.a. the Cobras) arms locker.

Bonilla also named a new Vice Minister of Security, Coralia Rivera, who previously was the Inspector General of the National Police.

Police Suspected of Murdering University Students

The Police in Barrio Granja are now the chief suspects in the death of two students at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Honduras early Saturday morning. The students were Alexander Vargas Castellanos and Carlos Pineda Rodriguez. Vargas Castellanos was the son of the rector of the University, Julieta Castellanos.

Crime scene technicians descended on the Police post in the Barrio Granja of Comayaguela and impounded three of the post's patrol vehicles and began collecting the records of who was patrolling Saturday morning when the two students were killed execution style.

The two students were killed in the early hours of Saturday morning after having been intercepted coming home after a birthday party for a friend. They were taken from their car and driven in another vehicle south of Tegucigalpa, where they were both killed.

Their vehicle was found later that day with four bullet holes from a 5.7 mm "mata policia (cop killer)" pistol. One shot, fired from behind the student's car, passed through both the back seat and driver's seat of the car, probably forcing them to stop. Such guns are illegal in Honduras, but were part of the ATF's Fast and Furious project which gave guns to criminals in Mexico, and were also part of the Operation Castaway where the ATF is alleged to have provided weapons to Honduran gangs.

Operation Castaway, run out of the Tampa Bay ATF office, was shut down in 2010, with the arrest of Hugh Crumpler III, Ramon Lopez, and others, but had been allowed to ship more than 1000 weapons (AK-47, AR-15, Fabrique Nacional Herstal 5.7mm "mata policia" pistols, and glock semi-automatic pistols) to the gangs in Honduras, among other destinations. Many of the weapons were later used in crimes in Central and South America and Puerto Rico.

Security Minister Pompeyo Bonilla confirmed to the press that the the material evidence points to renegade police as the suspects in the death of the two students. Police Commander Jose Luis Muñoz Licona, however said he would prefer to confirm the police were involved once they've arrested someone.

Professionalizing the Honduran Police: Advice from Germany

An article in La Tribuna today reports that Cristian Luth, the Director for Central America of the the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, says that the Foundation will advise the National Police in Honduras "to guarantee the professional development of their employees":

"The Friedrich Naumann Foundation, at the request of [Director of the National Police] Jose Luis Muñoz Licona, will work with the National Police to first perform a structural analysis, and then an analysis over the work of this important institution in conjunction with two German Police colonels. The result of this analysis will serve as a guide to this institution, and the Honduran government, to guarantee the high professional level of the Honduran Police."

Then-President Carlos Roberto Reina of the Liberal Party reportedly used the Foundation in 1996 and 1997 to advise on the separation of the National Police force from the Armed Forces by coordinating a dialogue between civilian and military representatives on the need of a democracy for independent institutions.

Luth said, "this also was the theme of the last year when we supported President Roberto Micheletti."

What is the Naumann Foundation, and what expertise does it have in reorganizing police forces in Latin America?

It describes itself as "a foundation for liberal politics," based on the ideas of German protestant theologian Friedrich Naumann, who believed that a functioning democracy needs politically informed and educated citizens. The Naumann Foundation intends to promote civic education, political dialogues, and political counseling. It is affiliated with the German Free Democratic Party (FDP), a Liberal party that is a minor partner with the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats, emphasizing neoliberal economic policies like privatization, deregulation, "reducing bureaucracy", and "reform of collective bargaining". In other words: Republicans.

The values the Friedrich Naumann Foundation espouses are interesting. One goal is that all citizens may freely live in an open society. It supports free markets, and access for all to education, labor, information, markets, and small government.

Curiously, the Foundation emphasizes that it is interested more in the equal application of rules to all rather than justice, because "just results do not exist."

The Friedrich Naumann Foundation has worked with the Liberal Party of Honduras (PLH in Spanish) for some time. Rosalinda Sabillón, the Foundation program director in Honduras bragged shortly before the coup that the Naumann Foundation had a "39 member caucus" in the Honduran Congress.

The Foundation offers seminars and training courses to Liberal Party members, and provides them with access to campaign advisors from the German FDP. President Zelaya had an FDP campaign advisor on his campaign, Peter Schroeder. Schroeder had worked as communications director for the FDP prior to forming his private company to manage political campaigns. The foundation also trained Mary Elizabeth Flores Flake, who Porfirio Lobo Sosa just appointed as ambassador to the UN, former candidate for president Elvin Santos, former Zelaya adviser Yani Rosenthal, Central Bank director under the de facto government Gabriela Nuñez, and the head of the de facto regime, Roberto Micheletti Bain, who in 2008 held meetings with FDP Vice President Werner Hoyer about intensifying the Foundation's activities in Honduras with an eye to the 2008 internal PLH elections.

Via its Central American director Cristian Luth, the Foundation promulgates the idea that Roberto Micheletti Bain "defended the constitution of Honduras against titanic forces", and that Manuel Zelaya was going to introduce "twenty-first century socialism" in Honduras. This was a position it took after Zelaya, formerly a protege, led Honduras in joining the ALBA alliance.

Today, the Naumann Foundation is promoting Elvin Santos as the best hope for re-uniting the Liberal Party, since he continues the ideas of Roberto Micheletti. The foundation regularly place their press releases in El Heraldo and La Tribuna as news stories. Their agenda for Honduras is clear, and adds to the evidence that last year's coup d'Etat, far from being entirely an internal struggle, was supported by global conservative economic, political, religious, and social forces.