Juana Carolina Vera González, the sister-in-law of San Pedro Governor Freddy D'Ecclesiis, turned herself in to the police on Sunday night at the 12th Metropolitan Police Station in Asunción. She presented herself voluntarily, accompanied by her lawyer, to begin serving an 11-year prison sentence, which is now final, for drug trafficking and criminal association.
After her identity was verified, she was transferred to the Women's Judicial Prison, where she is now at the disposal of the Court for the Enforcement of Sentences for Economic Crimes, Corruption, and Organized Crime. According to reports, Vera González had been under house arrest in Pedro Juan Caballero while she appealed the decision, but the confirmation of the sentence by the Supreme Court of Justice in June of last year exhausted all legal avenues.
The conviction is the result of Operativo Austral, a 2018 investigation by the Public Prosecutor's Office that dismantled an international cocaine trafficking network. During the operation, a search and seizure warrant was executed at the hangar of the company Halcón Peregrino S.A. in San Estanislao, where authorities seized seven aircraft, 448 kilograms of cocaine, and a 58-hectare property that, according to the prosecution, was used as a logistics center for clandestine flights to neighboring countries.