Argentina’s former environment secretary sentenced for misuse of public funds

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A trial court in Argentina sentenced Romina Picolotti, Secretary of Environment during the governments of Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007) and Cristina Fernández (2007-2015), to 3 years of suspended imprisonment in a case for fraudulent administration of public funds, judicial sources reported.

Federal Court 6 found Picolotti, who served as Secretary of Environment between June 2006 and December 2008, guilty.

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As reported by the Public Prosecutor’s Office on its website, the former official was convicted for the crime of fraudulent administration aggravated for having been committed to the detriment of the Public Administration.

In the proceedings, Picolotti was judged for using public funds to cover personal and other unjustified expenses for an amount which, updated, amounted to 6.9 million pesos (about US$67,000).

In addition to sentencing the former official to a three-year suspended prison sentence the trial court ordered Picolotti to be permanently disqualified from holding public office and paying the proceedings’ costs. In addition, Picolotti must reimburse the number of expenses to the Ministry of the Environment as reparation for the damage caused.

“I did not commit any crime”, Picolotti had assured this Monday morning, when she said her last words in the trial, a hearing that she followed remotely from the U.S. city of Miami, where she lives.

According to the court’s decision, Picolotti will have to report to the Argentine consulate in Miami every month.

Attorney General Diego Luciani had requested a sentence of 3 years and nine months imprisonment for the former official, while Picolotti’s defense had asked for her acquittal.

According to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the investigation proved that Picolotti used money allocated to the Secretariat of Environment to pay for personal expenses and other expenses not related to the activity of that agency.

She was also accused of using public funds for the purchase of air tickets for her mother, her children, her husband, her husband’s cousin, and other close relatives – some of whom in her department – which were registered in the accounting systems under the concept of “uprooting” or lacked justification.

She was also accused of hiring private flights for purposes unrelated to the functions of the Secretariat of Environment.

According to Luciani, when requesting Picolotti’s conviction, the act charged was “particularly serious, committed in a planned manner by a high-ranking State official, with deviation from her essential mission of watching over the interests and assets of the State.”

“It was proven, without any margin of doubt, absolutely irregular management, by Picolotti, of the public funds of the Secretariat of the Environment. It was not negligent management in the handling of funds, but a real fraud to the detriment of the public administration,” said the Attorney General at the time.