Chamber of Deputies President Raúl Latorre said during Hernán Rivas’s oral trial that the former lawmaker presented himself as a lawyer when he sought to represent the chamber on the Jurado de Enjuiciamiento de Magistrados (JEM).
“He presented himself as a lawyer,” Latorre told the trial court. According to the lawmaker, at the time there was no prior verification mechanism to confirm whether legislators actually held a law degree. Rivas’s candidacy was backed by his caucus and approved by the full chamber, with votes from both the governing bloc and the opposition.
Rivas is facing proceedings over the alleged production and use of public documents containing false information, specifically the alleged use of a false law degree and other documents related to his professional training. The charge is still being tried.
Constitutional lawyer Hugo Estigarribia said that, if there were a final conviction—one upheld after the applicable appeals—possible consequences would have to be examined for decisions made by the JEM while Rivas was participating and when he also chaired the body. That would depend on each case and, above all, on whether the former lawmaker’s vote was decisive in the removal or acquittal of a judge, prosecutor or public defender.
The possible review of decisions, in Estigarribia’s conditional legal assessment, would stem from Rivas’s alleged institutional role on the JEM, not solely from the case against him. He mentioned possible requests to annul or review removals and, potentially, acquittals, as well as claims against institutions that appointed Rivas, representatives of the Chamber of Deputies and Senate who supported him or were allegedly misled, and other people involved. He also cited possible compensation claims and criminal proceedings, whose legal classification would still have to be determined, related to document forgery or usurpation of public office.
Judges, prosecutors, public defenders and potentially affected complainants could, Estigarribia said, appeal to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and later to the Inter-American Court if they exhausted remedies in Paraguay’s system. These would be conditional possibilities, not automatic consequences or established effects.
The lawyer explained that the case remains before the trial court. The decision could be appealed by the parties to the Court of Appeals and, if the first- and second-instance rulings differed, a possible appeal to the Supreme Court could follow under the conditions he described.
Estigarribia described the episode as a serious institutional deviation and said it harms legal certainty and Paraguay’s international image. He also questioned the administrative conduct of institutions that could have verified the validity of the documents, including the Ministry of Education and Sciences and the National Agency for Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education (ANEAES).