Fugitive legislator-elect sneaks to take office, immunity in Mexico

Sep 23, 2010, 21:39 GMT

Mexico City - Mexican legislator-elect Julio Cesar Godoy, who had been a fugitive for 15 months and had been unable to take office, managed to escape police Thursday so as to sneak in and take his oath.

This simple trick will allow Godoy, a half-brother of Michoacan Governor Leonel Godoy, parliamentary immunity.

Police had set up a security ring around the Legislature to prevent Julio Cesar Godoy from taking office.

There is an arrest warrant against Godoy for his alleged ties with the drug gang La Familia. Other officials arrested on similar charges in the case known as the 'Michoacanazo' have been released in recent months as the courts found no elements to keep them in jail.

The Party of Democratic Revolution (PRD), to which Godoy belongs, says the allegations are part of a political manoeuvre by the government of Mexican President Felipe Calderon so that his National Action Party (PAN) can govern Michoacan.

Michoacan, in western Mexico, is Calderon's native state and is set to hold elections for governor and local authorities next year.

'This is an instrument that the federal government is using to attack our party and to win over the state of Michoacan,' Godoy said.

He accused the government of framing him.

Godoy was elected in July 2009 and should have taken his oath of office in September that year. On Thursday, he said immunity as a legislator is to give him the chance to defend himself properly.

According to Mexican public prosecutors, Godoy was in charge of providing institutional protection to La Familia.