Ex-Chubut judge who kissed cop-killer acquitted of criminal charges

A judge from the south of Argentina who lost her job after being caught on CCTV kissing a convict she previously jailed has been cleared of criminal charges.

Former Comodoro Rivadavia magistrate Mariel Alejandra Suárez was acquitted last week after Chubut Judge Marcelo Nieto Di Biase ruled her conduct – which he said was “ethically subject to reproach” – fell short of being a crime.

In 2021, Suárez became the centre of controversy when video footage was published in local media outlets showing her kissing prisoner Cristian ‘Mai’ Bustos, who is serving time for killing a policeman, at a jail in Chubut Province.

The court was not only repudiated for this action but also for lying.

According to the Chubut Attorney-General’s Office, “on December 30, 2021, she was informed as the corresponding criminal law judge in Comodoro Rivadavia that there was a detained person awaiting a hearing. She ‘deceitfully’ called in sick.”

“For that reason the hearing was fixed for the next day. The Attorney-General’s Office points out that, by lying over her state of health, she delayed a procedure corresponding to her function as the criminal law judge on duty,” continues the writ.

What invited rejection was that Suárez was found not to be ill that day but “in Trelew penitentiary, visiting a prisoner for personal motives.”

Her removal from the bench was ruled and a criminal case for malfeasance and nonfeasance was opened against her.

After analysing the legal categories and alleged facts, Judge Nieto Di Biase concluded last week that “the judge’s conduct does not infringe criminal law” on the understanding that “no hearing was fixed which afterwards was delayed by this conduct of Suárez and the hearing was finally held the next day within the period established by the law.”

“I consider the conduct displayed by the former criminal law judge Mariel Suárez, to be ethically subject to reproach but she has already been tried by the Impeachment Tribunal and removed from the bench, as is public knowledge,” said the judge.

Nieto Di Biase thus ruled out any crime and acquitted her along similar lines to judicial ombudsman Gustavo Oyarzún, who questioned the accusation presented by the prosecution as “not containing any criminal action nor explaining which law had been violated.”

On December 29, 2021, Suárez travelled to a prison located on Nacional Ruta 3 between the cities of Trelew and Puerto Madryn to meet with inmate Bustos.

According to the magistrate, the purpose of the meeting was linked to the development of a book she intended to write, though prison officers saw the two in an intimate situation.

The judge denied kissing the inmate, stating the “illegitimately recorded” video was “manipulated.”

Bustos is serving life imprisonment. He has been found guilty of two murders, that of his nine-month-old son and of a local policeman. He was convicted of his offspring’s death in 2005, but after learning of the verdict he escaped.

Confronted by police at his mother’s home four years later, in 2009, he opened fire with guns, fatally killing 33-year-old police officer Leandro ‘Tito’ Roberts and wounding another.