Wednesday, November 24, 2021

Reform in the Dominican Republic

 The reform of the Penal Code of the Dominican Republic was approved in the Senate today (Nov. 24, 2021) and will be sent to the Chamber of Deputies next week.  Two Congressmen (Jose Horacio Rodriguez of Alianza Pais and Juan Dionicio Rodriguez of the Frente Amplio) announced that they are opposed to the criminalization of abortion and that they plan to correct everything that has to do with interfamily violence and the provision regarding a military penal code.  Representatives of other political factions believe that the Penal Code will be approved quickly in the lower house in the same manner that it was approved in the Senate.

In 2019 the Constitutional Tribunal of the Dominican Republic issued a judgment (350/19 of 9  September 2019) stating that criminal military tribunals do not exist in the Dominican Republic. Last May, Carlos Luciano Diaz Morfa, the Minister of Defense, proposed that members of the Armed Forces could only be tried in military tribunals and not by the ordinary justice system.  Currently dozens of members of the Armed Forces are being tried for administrative corruption and the discussion has been whether a military court should be included in the Penal Code. But the Constitutional Tribunal has already decided the issue.

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