opinion

Also in this section:
Stimson, Moving a tree
Sirias, Hunter S. Thompson and Oscar Zeta Acosta
Shelton, A better way to do the post-Panamax locks
Pilgrim, Global warming --- Mother Earth's agony
Sánchez, Russia renews its Latin American ties
Silié, A new historical and geographical view of the Greater Caribbean
Reporters Without Borders, Freedom of the press threatened in Panama
Jackson, A fitting place for the legislature to do their dirty work

Bernal, A coup d'etat against freedom of expression

A good place for legislators to stand up for corruption and oppression

by Eric Jackson

In a nation ruled by swine, all pigs are upward mobile.

Hunter S. Thompson

Recall that one of the big sensational stories of 2005 was the death of a 19-year-old prostitute, one Vanessa Márquez. She was thrown, jumped or fell off of a 17th floor balcony at the Plaza Paitilla Inn, where she was working at a sex and drugs orgy for a group of male professionals, most of them married. The hotel managment was not only a beneficiary of the room rentals, but also an active participant in the festivities.

After Márquez plunged to her death, one of the men at the party orchestrated a cover-up that included stuffing the dead woman's clothing with grass and running her over with a car to make it look like a traffic accident, then coordinating things with the man who was then deputy director of the Judicial Technical Police (PTJ). After a sham autopsy the body was quickly cremated.

The courts have since held that due to the lack of (that most probably means destruction of) evidence, it can't be proven beyond a reasonable doubt whether Ms. Márquez's death was a homicide, suicide or accident. A couple of people spent some time in jail waiting trial on the homicide charges that were thrown out and another person is in trouble for providing drugs for the party, but there has been no justice for Vanessa Márquez and the courts have made some preliminary rulings that indicate that nobody is going to be held criminally accountable for altering the death scene or any of the rest of the cover-up either.

(The honorable exception to an otherwise solidly sordid story of injustice and impunity is that to her credit Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez fired the Public Ministry employees implicated in the scandal and it looks like those firings will stick.)

And so when the legislature decided to hold some private discussions about public business --- that is, a Penal Code reform that weakens the laws against domestic violence and rape, strengthens the ban on investigations for corruption of judges or legislators, and for the most party criminalizes investigative journalism, where did they choose to spend public funds for their retreat?

The Plaza Paitilla Inn, of course.

The Vanessa Márquez case? Well, after all she was just a prostitute. She was just a throw-away person --- just like almost everyone who will read these words, if maybe a few notches lower in the ranks of people whom our local elitists scorn due to her occupation. Márquez doesn't count and you don't count, unless you happen to be related to Pedrarias the Cruel, have a million bucks in your bank account or something like that. Only the select few have any rights that matter to our legislators.

And doesn't the deputies' choice of a hotel in which to meet and make odious decisions about our Penal Code tell us just about everything that we need to know about the nature of the beasts with which we deal?

Stimson, Moving a tree
Sirias, Hunter S. Thompson and Oscar Zeta Acosta
Shelton, A better way to do the post-Panamax locks
Pilgrim, Global warming --- Mother Earth's agony
Sánchez, Russia renews its Latin American ties
Silié, A new historical and geographical view of the Greater Caribbean
Reporters Without Borders, Freedom of the press threatened in Panama
Jackson, A fitting place for the legislature to do their dirty work

Bernal, A coup d'etat against freedom of expression