SANTO DOMINGO - Allegations that place Mérido Torres, director of the State's Land Titling Technical Unit, in the eye of the storm emerged over the weekend and hold the current government official responsible for allegedly committing violations of property rights and abuse of power in the performance of his duties.
A report by "Nuria Investigative Journalism," broadcast last Saturday, presented testimonies from people indicating that the unit headed by Torres had granted property titles to land invaders to the detriment of their real owners, despite the existence of Constitutional Court rulings ordering their eviction.
Mérid Torres has been in the national headlines in recent weeks, after his name appeared in the investigation of the Public Ministry's Calamar operation, which involves more than 20 people, including three former ministers from Danilo Medina's administration, arrested last March.
Milagros Ortiz Bosch, Director General of Ethics and Governmental Integrity, stated last week that Torres should take a leave of absence from his position, due to his mention in the case.
"I must tell you that I am neither resigning nor am I going to ask for a leave of absence, nor has anyone from the government asked me to leave my post," the official stated in a telephone call to the program "El Sol de la Mañana" on March 29, attributing his mention to political interests.
The complaints
From Montecristi, Amparo Peña Mena denounced that the Titling Unit placed invaders on her property as supposed owners, even though her family has in their possession the certificates issued by the Dominican Agrarian Institute (IAD), which accredits them as owners of a plot of 290 meters.
He stated that his family has lived on that plot of land in the Liniera community for more than 5 decades and that in 2011 they decided to go to the IAD to legalize their land and the entity proceeded to make a settlement for them.
She explained that the IAD gave her parents two certificates for land located in El Pocito, Guayubín, the same area where on March 17, President Luis Abinader led the delivery of more than a thousand property titles, many of whom, the complainant says, are not the real owners of said plots.
He asserted that they had been swindled by the State Land Titling Unit and its director, by not receiving the definitive title to their land.
He recounted that the property was invaded in 2015, so they were forced to submit the case to justice, obtaining a favorable ruling from the Constitutional Court.
He added that, given the non-compliance with the court order, in January 2022, the family sent a letter to President Luis Abinader along with copies of the rulings, requesting that he order the titling of their land. According to the documents he presented on the program, the president instructed Méridó Torres to give due attention to the notification.
According to Peña Mena's testimony, the property was once valued at 99 million pesos.
“This eviction they’re trying to carry out isn’t going to happen, listen carefully, it’s not going to happen. I spoke with the prosecutor yesterday, and she told me to submit the documentation we have, which is being prepared by the land titling commission. So I ask and implore you, please, not to participate in or assist this eviction, because we’ve been preventing it for a long time,” says Santiago Caba, deputy director of land titling, in an audio recording presented on the program.
He lamented that titles were given to the 11 invaders of his property who have an eviction order to comply with, as well as to those who have bought plots of land from them.
Santo Domingo East
On May 4th of last year 2022, José Antonio Ruiz Sánchez filed a complaint against Mérido Torres and his daughter Cindy Torres Polanco, for association of abuse of trust and abuse of power.
The complaint details that the Director of Land Titling, along with the head prosecutor of Santo Domingo East, Milcíades Guzmán, carried out an illegal eviction on March 31, 2022, by breaking into the complainant's property, at Avenida España #73, with armed personnel, forcing out a Haitian man who worked as a security guard.
The file states that at the time of the eviction, his client was not present due to post-surgical recovery, but in the evening of that same day, he went to the property and when he tried to enter with his keys he heard gunshots, so he called 911, who upon entering spoke with two guards from a private company who told them that they had been hired by the daughter of the Director of Titling, Cindy Torres, whom they called and asked to appear with the documents that accredited her as owner since Ruiz had his in hand.
He explains that 60 minutes after the conversation, a colonel named Aquino arrived, who told Ruiz that by “superior orders he had to take him into custody.”.
Ruiz Sánchez recounted that, still convalescing and despite the absence of a judge's order, he was taken to the Invivienda detachment and handed over to Colonel Orlando Báez Severino, who also told him that the order came from above, that it was nothing personal, and proceeded to call prosecutor Héctor Romero Peña, who says he was receiving orders from his superior, prosecutor Milcíades Guzmán.
The complainant's lawyer, Gabriel Méndez Cordero, told Nuria Investigación Periodística that the authorities kept his client in jail for three days without presenting him with any type of coercive measure.
He said he managed to leave after being coerced into signing this handwritten sheet, signed by the director of titling and his daughter, Cindy Mariel Torres, in which he agrees to leave the land, which according to a certification from the General Directorate of Internal Taxes (DGII) is valued at about 5 million 618 thousand 589 pesos.
He stated that after 4 months in court without any results, in September 2022 he sent a communication to the Directorate of Ethics and Governmental Integrity.
On November 18, two months later, they received a response from DIGEIG, which claims that "there is no evidence to attribute to Mérido Torres the commission of a crime or the use of the public military structure for private gain, therefore the complaint should be archived.".
