by Rod Hughes

The recent deportation of seven Colombian hit men planning the assassination of former Security Minister Fernando Berrocal and Minister of the Presidency Rodrigo Arias underscores the need of new legislation to deal with organized crime. The alleged killers-for-hire are reported to have been contracted by Colombian drug lords after Costa Rican police intercepted record tonnages of cocaine in the past 18 months.

The deported foreigners had not executed their alleged plan and therein lies the defect in current law. Costa Rica has no law against conspiracy to commit a crime. Instead, it has a vague clause in the criminal code called “illicit association,” a charge difficult to prove and all but worthless to prevent crime. How can a prosecutor prove it if innocent persons may also come into contact with criminals?

One of the Colombians, Franklin Viveros, was hastily deported in order to keep him from exploiting another loophole, this one in the immigration laws that would have allowed him remain in the country by marrying a local woman. A new law that would have prevented this is, like the 123-page comprehensive crime law, also hung up in the legislative pipeline.

But, in Viveros’s case, two separate agencies combined to foil his citizenship quest, after the Civil Registry approved his citizenship on Jan. 22. But the Ministry of Public Security notified the Supreme Elections Tribunal which annulled his attempt to get a citizen ID card. This unique step had only been used three times before in history.Ordinarily, the tribunal is only concerned with making sure that the ID used during elections is valid.

But Viveros is a yo-yo criminal, deported three times in the last four years. When he arrived in Colombia, naturally authorities let him go, since he committed no crime there. While many hailed the unusual cooperation between the two agencies as hopeful, it really did nothing to correct weak laws that allow fake marriages, presided over by corrupt notaries. Notary Administrator Alicia Bogarin, who oversees the 10,000 notaries in the country, admits, “We are talking about drug- and human-trafficking mafias and this is really about national securitiy.”

Immigration Director Mario Zuniga has been trying to get his new legislation through the crowded agenda choked with bills needed to validate the Central American Free Trade Agreement. The new crime law is in committee and as yet has no funding to implement it. Meanwhile the only bright light in the dark picture has been this isolated case of interagency coordination.