by Rod Hughes

Earthquakes and a late awakening of citizens to the worth of their national monuments have claimed many historic buildings in this country. This is why far fewer historic structures remain standing here than in many Latin American countries. But one worth a visit is the police commissary in Cartago.

Unfortunately, the original building, built during the administration of Chief of State Braulio Carrillo (1835-42) was nearly destroyed by the 1910 earthquake that brought down in ruins so much of the old capital. But the replacement is worth seeing, built in neo-colonial style with a low, square tower, painted white with darker detailing. It is fronted by gardens worth the visit on their own merit.

A movement is afoot now to build a new police headquarters. But instead of condemning the old structure to the wrecking crews as would have been done up until the 1970s, many would like the building converted into an ethnic museum.

by Rod Hughes

Holy Steinbrenner! Do you suppose that changing the field marshal of a sports club really helps a team? Maybe so…

San Carlos, playing on their home grass in Ciudad Quesada and sporting a new head coach, Juan Carlos Arguedas, dumped a lackluster Cartago yesterday 2-1. Carlos Hernandez, sports writer for La Nacion, seems to think that players do better in their first game under a new coach.

It was only 12 minutes into the match when fancy footwork by Luis Pena allowed Enoc Perez to score. Some 12 minutes later, an error by Cartago goalie Donny Grant allowed a goal by Edder Munguio for 2-1. In fact, all through the first half San Carlos played with a creativity and verve the side has not shown all season.

In the second half they forgot all they had learned in the first, but fornuately for them Cartago was soon playing with 19 men after Andreas Sanabria was sent off with too many yellow warnings. As it was, Cartago’s Minor Diaz sent a corner kick from Esteban Bolanos through the arc. After that, San Carlos fans began urging the clock to run faster.

by Rod Hughes

A Uminer poll commissioned by the leading daily newspaper, La Nación, shows the “yes” vote for the Central american Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with a razor-thin lead in the run-up to the Oct. 7 referendum vote. But, taking into account normal error in the survey, it is a virtual tie.

Last minute maneuvering has trotted out endorsements for and against CAFTA, some of them of dubious value. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton said he backed Costa Rica’s joining the trade pact, although he admitted he had not studied the text “enough to win a dabate” on it. “The U.S. must make it easy” to open up markets for its friends to sell in U.S. markets, he said.

Perhaps the least effective was the visit of Sen. Bernie Sanders and Congressman Michael Michaud at the invitation of CAFTA opponent Ottón Solís. Both U.S. politicians have voted against both CAFTA on Capitol Hill as well as expressing opposition to extending the Caribbean Basin Initiative of which Costa Rica receives trade benefits. Their opposition is based upon their fear that CAFTA will export U.S. jobs, exactly what pro-CAFTA voters want here.

Tomás Dueñas, Costa Rican ambassador to the U.S, commented acidly, “These two gentlemen who came here, by their own record, show they don’t have any interest in developing trade, don’t have any interest in creating jobs, nor in developing the region.” The ambassador also expressed doubts that the U.S. would renegotiate the treaty and even if it happened, experience with renegotiation of Peru, Panama and Colombia indicates that the result would be more of a disadvantage to Costa Rica.

Not only U.S. endorsements are featured. One pro-CAFTA poster contains a photo of Costa Rica’s favorite son, Dr. Franklin Chang and a far-left politician named Merino. Chang, U.S. astronaut and a physicist, notes, the caption under the photo, has come out in support of the treaty. Merino is a communist, notes the other caption, and is a deadly foe of CAFTA. The poster asks whose advice the reader will take.

Not very thoughtly, but an effective piece of propaganda.

Amid all the gloom and doom predictions by both sides of the divisive issue, the leading English-language weekly The Tico Times presented in this week’s issue an editorial with a different take on all the sturm und drang: The referendum is only about a trade pact, for heaven’s sake, and will hardly be the panacea or the disaster depending on a si or no vote, the editorial writer said. Instead of focusing all their attention on the vote, the politicians should get on with such tasks as fixing potholes, cutting red tape and such, the writer added.

Today’s La Nacion notes that some 120 Web sites feature cartoons and humor regarding the issue, so all is not so deadly serious. Only a few of the Web pages feature humor that will offend either side, showing that not only The Tico Times is trying to keep some perspective on the issue.

And President Oscar Arias called for Ticos of both sides to keep calm and be kind to one another during the debate and the voting that culminates it.

Note: We would like to apologize for the tardiness of this report, written much earlier but delayed by technical problems.

by Rod Hughes

Puntarenas fans are grieving because they thought their soccer team could. Coming fresh from a good shellacking of Saprissa in Costa Rica’s first Division Sunday, they were all but certain they could get past Saprissa and move on in the UNCAF soccer tourney.

But it was not to happen, partly because the three forward system, old fashioned as it seemed, had worked well with Saprissa last Sunday. But in the first half, it did not work at all. Late in the first half Sapriss’s Alonso Solís drew first blood with the help of Gabriel Badilla. Puntarenas did not tie until minute 69 on a shot by Eduardo GomezAt minute 83, despite revived second half play by the port city, Saprissa’s Armando Alonso, assisted by Jairo Arrieta (who had replaced Alejandro Alpizar only three minutes earlier) drove in the deciding goal. It was 2-1, Saprissa’s ticket to the semifinals.

Saprissa has its eye on the championship and a slot at the World Cup for soccer clubs, but it seemed a long way away when they struggled against a revived Puntarenas offense.

by Rod Hughes

So half of the UNCAF soccer tournament semifinals will be fought out on Costa Rican soil, since Alajuela got by Real España of Honduras on goal kicks, 5-4 after ending regulations play in a 2-2 tie. The first semifinal game will be in Tibas’s Ricardo Saprissa Stadium Oct. 23, followed by the windup at Alajuela Oct. 31. the winner will play the winner of the Municpal vs. Motagua series in the finals.

In the kind of shootout that ended the latest game, one goalie is the hero and one the goat. In this case, Alajuela’s Wardy Alfaro wears the laurels. Briefly, scoring went like this: Real España’s Everaldo Ferreira drew first blood on a pass by Elder Valladares only to find it evened up by Victor Nuñez. Roy Mayrie put Alajuela ahead on Nuñez’s pass but forward Melvin Valladares tied it.

This left it up to Alfaro who blocked a penalty kick by Jose Carlos Díaz. The warriors from La Liga, as Alajuela is called in its official title, did not miss at all.

This means that the traditional rivals will square off in a two-game series that is sure to pack the stands, a classico of classicos. You can be certain that Saprissa is going to keep an eye on Alajuela’s Victor El mambo Nuñez who lead UNCAF with three goals. Saprissa midfielder Walter Centeno has two in the tourney.

by Rod Hughes

SANTA CRUZ, GUANACASTE–A leatherback turtle, one-and-a-half meters long, swam ashore Sept. 15 to lay her eggs on Junquillal Beach a full month before the average season starts. Usually, the season begins in the middle of October and ends in March of the following year. Last year for example, it began Oct. 17.

“We hope for an egg-laying season more abundant than in recent years,” said scientists of the World Wildlife Fund. The leatherback is one of the most endangered species in the world—91,000 were counted laying eggs in 1980 and only a thousand last year. Scientists in Costa Rica as well as throughout the world have been alarmed at the declining numbers coming ashore.

But scientists are even more encouraged that the turtles come earlier, in cooler weather–beach sand termparture determines the sex of most of the baby turtles born in the shallow nests. If the season is late, temperatures of more than 30 degrees Celsus can “cook” the soft-shelled eggs hard. None of the eggs hatch, then.

At Junquillal, a squad of eight young men, nicknamed the “Baula Boys,” protected the nests from marauding dogs–and poachers. Although it is prohibited to harvest more than a small percentage of the eggs, they are still consumed, mostly in cantinas, for their mythical virllity-instilling powers.

by Rod Hughes

SAN JOSE–It’s all over but the automatic mandatory review of the trial record by an appellate court. Former public defender Luis Fernando Burgos, accused of strangling his wife and transporting her body to a remote dumping site, is guilty and the prosecution’s plea for a maximum sentence of 35 years is granted.

(See articles 1301, 1343 and 1345 for background)

Co-defendant Zulay Rojas, a former prosecutor for the court, was sentenced to two years probation for covering up evidence before she finally came forward to tell of Burgos’s confession to her on the day of the murder. During that probation period, she will remain free only if she commits no further misdeeds.

The three female magistrates making up the panel of judges found that Burgos was a violent, controling person whose abusiveness escalated from their courtship until he strangled his wife, legal assistant Maureen Hidalgo, at their condo on July 11, 2006. They also found that cell phone calls he made came from locations that completely contradicted his alibi for the day of her disappearance.

While acknowleging the lack of forensic evidence, the tribunal gave credence to the prosecution witnesses when they testified to his having confessed his homicide. They also found his delay in informing authorities of Maureen’s disappearance and his agitation during the time until her body was discovered telling evidence.

All during the hour it took the three judges to read their findings, Burgos kept his head down as if studying the table before him, his face impassive. It is possible that, being a public defense lawyer, the outcome did not surprise him. The verdict itself was written with an uncustomary lack of legalistic language and was well organized.

The family of Maureen Hidalgo was also granted 136 in damages for the equivalent of wrongful death. Her parents told the daily La Nacion that they ‘feel that Maureen will rest in peace now.”

The judges did not buy the testimony of a psychiatrist who said that Zulay Rojas was “paralyzed by fear and nerves” as the reason she did not come forward to denounce the murder sooner. The magistrates cited telephone records turned up by the judicial investigators indicating that she called Burgos repeatedly after the murder. Moreover, despite the denial by the psychiatrist that Rojas was only a distant friend of Burgos, they cited e-mails in “affectionate” terms that passed between the Rojas and Burgos.

Commentary: Even if the Burgos guilty verdict should be overturned, the trial could well serve as a cautionary tale for young women. Knowing that Burgos was abusive, Maureen Hidalgo went ahead to marry him. Perhaps, as some testimony indicated, he had threatened her if she did not. Or, perhaps she felt that, as so many before her, she could “change him with love.” Human beings DO change over the years, but is it worth the misery until they do? And they do not always change for the better…

by Rod Hughes

While the judges deliberate in the Burgos murder trial, another, much longer, murder trial is winding up this week with final summations. In this one, Fr. Minor Calvo, a controversial, once-popular Catholic priest, and businessman Calixto Chaves are accused of hiring the gunmen who murdered radio journalist Parmenio Medina.

Medina was gunned down gangland style as he left his home in his car in July, 2001. He had received death threats connected with his investigations for his lively and irreverant news show, although just what he was investigating is not known for certain.

Yesterday, prosecutor Guiselle Rivera asked the three-judge panel trying the high-profile case to sentence both Calvo and Chaves to 51 years in prison each for allegedly menacing, pursuing and finally ordering Medina’s death. *Costa Rican law limits sentences to 35 years, but a longer sentence prevents them from being released early for good behavior.)

The trial of the accused began Dec. 5, 2005, but due to the number of defendants, has proceeded at a slow pace due to the amount of evidence turned up by investigators in three and a half years and the number of defendants, eight, and defense attorneys, nine.

Rivera has asked the judges to dismiss charges against one defendant, Jorge Castillo, for “lamentably” a lack of evidence. But she is asking 30 years for John Gilberto Guitierrez as the alleged go-between the triggermen and Calvo and Chaves She is also asking the same sentences for the alleged gunmen,Luis Alberto Aguirre, Juan Gabriel Caravajal and Randal Gonzalez. The prosecutor is asking 20 year sentences for alleged complicity for Danny Smith and Juan Ramon Hernandez.

Smith is accused of having followed Medina as he left for work and Hernandez of having disposed the the vehicle used in the shooting.

The prosecution’s case is based upon the thesis that Medina had been using his radio show, La Patada, half satire and half investigative journalism, as a means to uncover Fr. Calvo’s misapprovpriation of funds collected by a religious radio station he had established, Radio Maria. Some of the millions of colones (hundreds of thousands of dollars) collected by the immensely popular station allegedly went into farms titled in the names of Calvo’s family members. Rivera named Chaves as the financial brains of the alleged Radio Maria scam.

Although Calvo and Chaves are accused of being the plotters of the murder, in her summary Riviera mentioned the mysterious person whose shadowy presence (but not identity) has hovered over the case. Before he was murdered, Medina had mentioned an unnamed political figure of the highest rank as being a menace. To Rivera, he (or she) was the “great absentee” in the proceedings.

by Rod Hughes

President Oscar Arias has returned from his convalescence from an inflamed tendon to the campaign trail to promote a yes vote on the referendum to approve or deny participation in the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). In an exclusive interview published today in the daily La Nacion, the President criticized opponents of CAFTA for lying to the public.

He listed a number of myths perpetrated by the opposing campaign such as that it will eliminate public education, would weaken the Social Secuirty system (CAJA) by prohibiting the purchase of generic medicines, would take away the water and the marine riches from the waters around Cocos Island (commercial fishing is forbidden in this protected area), that the country would manufactures arms, etc. He said the latest question he had been asked was, “Is it true that if CAFTA’s approved that my son will have to fight in Iraq?”

But he also had some criticism of the proCAFTA campaign. He said he watches little TV but what he had seen appeared weak to him. Indeed, the “heart” symbol is now gone from the “yes” vote ads and a more direct approach touting the benefits of the pact has been announced. Both sides used the heart as a symbol, beginning with the opponents who used it to replace the “o” in the word “no.” It was an urging to follow one’s feelings when voting.

Arias said he had no plan B in case the vote failed to favor CAFTA but expressed complete confidence that CAFTA would be approved. He reacted to the threat by the Citizen Action Party and a couple of dissident congressmen to recognise the result of a favorable vote for the treaty by saying calmly, “They have to. A yes vote would be the will of the people.”

The President had reacted by calling “unacceptable” the recent memo by former Vice President Kevin Casas that suggested that mayors who did not deliver a yes vote in the referendum should be punished by having funds withheld from their municipalities He acknowledged that the resulting scandal in which Casas resigned (see article 1349) may have effected the campaign slightly.

Both Casas and memo co-author Fernando Sanchez apologized for the proposals. But the President observed acidly that no one had apologized for the graffito he saw reading, “The Constitutional Chamber (of the Supreme Court) is Arias’s whore…” or for questioning the court’s legitimacy “every time a decision went against their interests.” (This is an indirect reference to several union leaders who have made similar statements.)

Meanwhile, both campaigns are white hot with the anti-CAFTA forces planning more media advertising. Most of their propaganda has been confined to spray-painted graffiti and placards, plus buttonholing passersby at agriculture fairs and like events. However, they must hurry. Although they have 12 days to the Oct. 7 referendum, all parties are forbidden to procelytize after Oct. 4.

Both Casas and Sanchez, the latter a congressman who refuses to resign from his seat despite a clamor from CAFTA opposition, are gone from the “yes” campaign. But still, rumors circulate that a voting fraud is planned, a fabrication that Supreme Election Tribunal chief Luis antonio Sobrado vigorously denies. The tribunal was created in the 1949 Constitution as an independent body to prevent just such political frauds and is unique in the world.

The rumors are passed by bulk e-mails and claim that 5 million ballots were printed so that false votes could replace or duplicate the real ones or that a special software would distort the result. Sobrado says that less then 3 million ballots were printed.

by Rod Hughes

Are you ready for this, friends? Puntarenas 4, Saprissa 1.

Last year’s champs appeared much like has-beens in the port city’s Lito Perez Stadium yesterday. It appeared at first like a normally hard-fought First Division game with Puntarenas’s Jose Garro opening scoring after 22 minutes of play and Saprissa’s Jody Stewart evening it up two minutes later.

Rodolfo Arnaez made it two for Puntarenas with an accurate bullet before the first half ended. Greaves made it 3-1 and Saprissa coach Jeaustin Campos may have felt the premonitions of disaster, especially with the fancy footwork Jorge Barboza had been using all day to confound Saprissa defenders. Then Barboza made the fourth goal.

Wednesday, Saprissa again meets Puntarenas in the UNCAF international tournament of clubs for the right to go on to the semifinals and Campos hopes recent history won’t be repeated.

Santos 2, San Carlos 1

San Carlos not only lost another game in a so-far-dismal season but also its head coach, Julio Cesar Cortes, who resigned. Paulo Rodriguez opened scoring for San Carlos after only three minutes and was on his way to being a hero until Johnny Acosta blotted his copybook with a self-inflicted goal that evened it up. But Marvin Chinchilla scored for Santos with 10 minutes left in the match. San Carlos had appeared all afternoon like interested observers.

Heredia 3, Liberia 0

Heredia had it all their way over the hapless Liberia Mia team, dealing the Guanacaste province team its fourth consecutive loss. Star midfielder Jafet Soto sank the first one barely 14 minutes in, Liberia’s Jorge Retana the second on an autogoal (oh, that’s embarrassing!) and Gerald Drummand the third early in the second half.

Carmelita 3, Cartago 1

Cartago is often referred to as the “foggy city” but the only fog on the bright day at Fello Meza Stadium was the home 11. After 15 minutes, Carmelita’s Minor Diaz brought gloom but David Diach brought a ray of sunshine by evening it up before the first half ended.

But Alejandro Gonzalez’s cannon shot early in the second stanza brought back the gloom, deepened by Kaylor Soto’s last minute goal. Tennis, anyone?

Brujas 1, UCR 0

Ring out the bells! Brujas of Escazu won a match, only its second this season. It all happened when Ricardo Harris centered the ball to Ricardo Steer who lofted it, then headed it into the University of Costa Rica’s goal. Unusual, but whatever works…