(IPYS/IFEX) – On 6 May 2004, the Lima-based newspaper “El Comercio” reported that businessman Fernando Zevallos Gonzáles has launched another civil defamation complaint against the newspaper, demanding US$100 million in compensation. Zevallos is facing drug trafficking charges and his trial is scheduled to resume on 1 June in Lima’s Superior Court. According to information published […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – On 6 May 2004, the Lima-based newspaper “El Comercio” reported that businessman Fernando Zevallos Gonzáles has launched another civil defamation complaint against the newspaper, demanding US$100 million in compensation. Zevallos is facing drug trafficking charges and his trial is scheduled to resume on 1 June in Lima’s Superior Court.
According to information published by “El Comercio”, Zevallos launched the complaint against Alejandro Miro Quesada Garland, the newspaper’s director-general, director Alejandro Miro Quesada Cisneros, Fernando Ampuero Del Bosque, head of the newspaper’s investigation unit, and Miguel Ramírez Puelles, an investigative journalist and the author of the articles on the Zevallos case. The newspaper itself was named as the “third party responsible” in the case.
According to Zevallos, the basis of the defamation case is a 13 April article published by the newspaper’s investigation unit, which reproduced a 16 April 2001 letter sent by the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to Judge María Zavala Valladares. Zevallos’s defence lawyers have argued that the letter does not exist since there is no record of it in the Imprisoned Criminals’ Court (Sala Penal para Reos en Cárcel) registry.
“El Comercio” insisted, however, that the letter does exist, that a fax copy of it has been published several times and that it was signed by the DEA’s current director in Perú, Terry Parham.
