SANTO DOMINGO.- During the first hearing on coercive measures held yesterday, against ten of the accused of allegedly embezzling from the Dominican State through the National Health Insurance ( SeNaSa ), where more than 15 billion pesos were allegedly misappropriated, according to the Public Prosecutor's Office, the first defendants who testified before Judge Rigoberto Sena admitted some of the facts and attributed significant responsibility for the events to the former director, Santiago Hazim .
The defendants Eduardo Read Estrella, Cinty Acosta Sención, and Heidi Mariela Pineda Perdomo have given consistent statements before the judge of the Permanent Attention Court of the National District, reported Martín Rubiera, representative of another defendant, who confirmed the uniformity of the testimonies: “They have all stated the same thing, that they delivered valuables, money, in his favor in this scheme… he has 3-3 against him so far, three defendants who… have confessed part of the accusation and have stated a participation in which Hazim is significantly affected,” the Listín Diario published today.
Similarly, lawyer Surun Hernández pointed out that the accused Read Estrella declared before the court that he had "delivered" one billion pesos in cash to Mr. Hazim.
The Public Prosecutor's Office has requested 18 months of preventive detention against Hazim and the other nine involved in the fraud .
Eduardo Read Estrella , through his company Grupo Read , allegedly received payments amounting to more than RD$7.11 billion from August 2020 to August 2025, for contracts and addenda with the ARS .
Surun Hernández described the scheme as a “cruel act against humanity ” and asserted that the process has “abundance of evidence,” such as payments, transfers, and money laundering .
Following the direct accusations linking him to receiving bribes , Santiago Hazim's defense, led by lawyer Marcos Valentín Contreras, requested to speak last before the judge.
“Dr. Hazim’s defense requested that he speak last because the defendants say that they received bribes through a man nicknamed 'the fat one,'” Contreras stated, requesting the opportunity to refute the allegations.
The Public Prosecutor's Office identifies José Pablo Ortiz Giráldez as "the fat one" and points him out as Hazim's "right-hand man" and the "key" person in the alleged collection of bribes from SeNaSa's contracting companies .
Most serious case
Mirna Ortiz, head of the Specialized Prosecutor's Office for the Prosecution of Administrative Corruption, stated that the National Health Insurance (Senasa) case is the most serious corruption case the agency has ever presented. "Operation Cobra is the most serious corruption operation the Public Prosecutor's Office has brought to date," said Ortiz, following the postponement of the pretrial detention hearing against the group accused by the prosecution of embezzling funds from the insurance entity that covers more than 70% of the Dominican population.
For his part, the Director General of Prosecution of the Public Ministry, Wilson Camacho , described the case as one of the biggest that the Public Ministry has had, while also calling it " sinister and cruel ".
