An Ecuadorian court on Friday ruled that the detention of former vice president Jorge Glass at the Mexican Embassy was illegal and arbitrary, yet it kept him in prison as he still has an eight-year sentence to serve from two prior convictions issued in earlier years.
The Specialized Court for Family, Children, Adolescents and Juvenile Offenders of the National Court of Justice of Ecuador, composed of magistrates Mónica Heredia, Liz Barrera and Adrián Rojas, found violations of Glass’s rights because the Ecuadorian state did not follow the prescribed procedures for the search and access to diplomatic missions as defined by national law.
The court denied Glass’s habeas corpus petition, a bid to overturn his detention and transfer him to Mexico or another country willing to grant asylum, as the Mexican government had done hours before his detention by designating him a political persecuted individual.
“The immediate release of the affected person would be appropriate, yet there are res judicata sentences,” stated the tribunal, noting that the former vice president under Rafael Correa (2007-2017) had left prison in 2022 without fully serving the pending sentences, due to a controversial judicial decision on precautionary measures.
Glass was convicted in 2017 of illicit association in the Odebrecht case and in 2020 received an eight-year sentence for bribery in the Sobornos case, related to irregular funding of the correísta political movement, in which the former president was also convicted.
Denied early release
[–>]
Recently he had managed to consolidate the two sentences into a single eight-year term and sought the penitentiary benefit of early release or prelibertad, aiming to avoid returning to prison after spending nearly five years locked up between 2017 and 2022, but the request was denied.
No obstante, Glass was apprehended due to a preventive detention order tied to reconstruction works following the 2016 earthquake, where he is accused of alleged embezzlement—an offense punishable in Ecuador’s penal code by roughly a decade plus a few years in prison.
The court upheld the arrest warrant, finding that it complied with the national legal framework and was supported by sufficient evidence of the crime and a flight risk given that Glass was already staying at the Mexican Embassy.
The former vice president had been at the Mexican diplomatic mission since December 17, 2023, seeking asylum after declaring himself a political persecuted and a victim of lawfare, alleging innocence on all charges.
Mexico’s government, led by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, granted asylum on April 5 amid a diplomatic crisis with Ecuador, and hours later Ecuadorian police and military forces stormed the embassy to detain Glass.
Glass files accusations of torture
From La Roca, Ecuador’s maximum-security prison, Glass spoke via video link at the hearing and claimed he was tortured during detention, describing a beating that involved kicks, knee strikes and blows as he was removed from the Mexican Embassy.
He also said that the men who detained him wore masks, did not identify themselves, and only informed him of his rights after he was moved to the flagrancy unit.
The habeas corpus court did not assign blame to President Daniel Noboa or to the minister of government and interior, and stated its lack of jurisdiction to adjudicate the asylum granted by Mexico.
According to Ecuador’s government, the asylum granted to Glass was illegal and violates the Diplomatic Asylum Convention, which presumes asylum is not available to individuals already facing ordinary-justice charges for common crimes.