Prosecutors check Dina Boluarte’s gold Rolex
Employees of the Peruvian prosecutor’s office and police from the department for the investigation of particularly complex cases (Diviac) arrived at the government palace (presidential residence), where the president was Dina Boluarte, reported by RPP Prime Minister Gustavo Adrianzen.
Prosecutors arrived at the scene at 4:29 a.m. local time (12:29 Moscow time) to conduct a search in the so-called Rolex case against Boluarte. One of the prosecutors Harvey Colchado told reporters that they would “conduct an inspection at the government palace.” “Everything is confidential; later the prosecutor’s office will announce what was seized,” he said.
Boluarte’s lawyers also arrived at the building without making statements to the media, RPP notes. The prosecutor’s office appeared at the presidential residence several hours after the searches began at Boluarte’s home. As the portal reported, the door was not opened to representatives of the prosecutor’s office, after which the police knocked it down with a battering ram. Boluarte was not at home; her lawyers were there.
Chief Justice Juan Carlos Checkley Soria issued a search warrant. Prior to this, the Prosecutor General’s Office filed a request in connection with an alleged crime related to illegal enrichment, as well as failure to declare expensive watches.
Mid March portal La Encerrona reportedthat the president has a collection of luxury watches, including Rolex, after analyzing about 10 thousand photographs. According to the portal’s calculations, Boluarte has 14 expensive watches. In particular, during her public appearances, the president wore a Rolex watch, “made of steel and rose gold,” which costs from $6 thousand to $14 thousand, which exceeds the salary of the head of state: 15 thousand Singapore dollars (about $11 thousand). .
The president herself did not deny that she has a Rolex watch, adding that it is “the fruit of her work.”
After the searches, Adrianzen ruled out that Boluarte or anyone in the government was planning to resign.
Villena also said Boluarte should present three Rolex watches to investigators and warned the president against destroying or hiding them. According to him, the declarations of income and assets of the head of state for the last two years will be carefully checked for violations.
In July 2021, Dina Boluarte became Vice President of Peru and Minister of Social Inclusion. In December 2022, she led the country after her predecessor Pedro Castillo tried to dissolve Congress and take control of the state into his own hands, which is why he was removed from office and arrested.
At least 49 people were killed in the ensuing protests in the country’s poor south. Human rights groups say the government has used disproportionate and indiscriminate violence and are calling for those responsible to be held accountable. The decision to send troops to disperse the protests was made by 57-year-old Alberto Otarola, the former head of the country’s Ministry of Defense, whom Boluarte appointed as prime minister.
In early March 2024, Otarola was forced to resign as prime minister amid a scandal: Peruvian media published an audio recording of a conversation between him and a 25-year-old woman, Yazire Pinedo, with whom he was clearly flirting. Local sources claim that in 2023, Pinedo, thanks to the patronage of the prime minister, received government contracts worth over $14 thousand. When he resigned, Otarola declared his innocence and called the audio evidence of his flirtation with Pinedo a fake, created as part of the political machinations of ill-wishers.