A Guatemalan court has ordered top Social Security officials and other suspects jailed during a probe of alleged fraud and corruption at the institute, the latest scandal besetting the government of President Otto Perez Molina.
Judge Silvia de Leon's ruling late Tuesday in a marathon hearing that lasted more than 30 hours allows prosecutors to investigate the suspects for at least two months.
The 17 suspects include the president of Social Security, a former private secretary and close confidant of Perez Molina; a businessman who is on the institute's board of directors; the head of Guatemala's Central Bank; and a Supreme Court justice's son.
According to prosecutors and a U.N. commission investigating criminal networks in the country, the Social Security board authorized a $15 million contract last November to provide dialysis treatment to kidney patients. Officials purportedly took money for awarding the contract.
Investigators presented wiretap recordings in which the Supreme Court justice's son allegedly spoke with executives at Drogueria Pisa de Guatemala about the possibility of charging 16 per cent commissions.
Judge de Leon said in her ruling that the company lacked a health license to provide medical services.
"If trying to make money without providing the appropriate service is not a crime, we are in a demoralized society without ethics," she said.
Authorities say at least 13 patients later died from contaminated treatments, although for now the probe is focusing only on the alleged fraud and graft instead of possible criminal responsibility for the deaths.
A string of scandals have led to rising anger and protests, with many people calling for the resignation of Perez Molina and other top officials.
The largest was a multimillion-dollar customs bribery and fraud scheme in which officials allegedly took cash to charge lower import duty fees.
That scandal led to the resignation of then-Vice-President Roxana Baldetti, whose private secretary was named by investigators as the alleged mastermind. Baldetti has not been charged and denies involvement in the scheme.
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