Hugo Chávez’s nurse threatens Blitz to take away information merchandise about her corruption

Claudia Díaz, nurse of Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez tried to bully Blitz by a person named Christian Ericsen with the infamous aim of getting a report on Diaz printed on this newspaper final yr.

In April 2023, BBC in its report mentioned, Claudia Díaz, who Chávez named as Venezuela’s nationwide treasurer, is the most recent in a collection of Venezuelan ex-top officers to be jailed within the US.

Díaz and her husband had been discovered responsible of laundering thousands and thousands of {dollars} that they had acquired in bribes from a Venezuelan media mogul.

That they had each denied the costs and rejected a plea deal.

Claudia Díaz and her husband, Adrián Velásquez, have been arrested in 2018 in Spain, the place they lived a lavish life-style.

She instructed BBC Information Mundo in an interview [in Spanish] in 2018 that their riches have been earned by her husband by companies he had even earlier than the couple had met. However a courtroom in Florida discovered the couple had accepted and laundered thousands and thousands of {dollars} in bribes from Venezuelan media mogul Raúl Gorrín throughout Díaz’s time on the helm of Venezuela’s treasury from 2011 till 2013.

In change for the bribes, Díaz allowed Raúl Gorrín to purchase US {dollars} at a less expensive fee from the treasury which he then resold on the black market at an enormous revenue, the courtroom discovered. The media tycoon, who owns Globovisión information community, has additionally been charged with corruption and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has positioned him on its “most needed” record.

The 15-year-sentence imposed on Claudia Díaz and her husband, who was President Chávez’s head of safety, is among the longest handed down by a US courtroom towards corrupt Venezuelan ex-officials.

The decide mentioned that the couple had “made some huge cash” and “drastically modified their life” with their ill-gotten beneficial properties.

Diaz’s profession specifically was meteoric. A Navy sergeant, she was a part of the president’s guard of honor earlier than becoming a member of the group that nursed Hugo Chávez when he had most cancers.

Regardless of having no background in finance, Chávez named her nationwide treasurer, a job she held from 2011 till the president’s dying in 2013.

Born within the Andean metropolis of San Cristobal in 1973, Claudia Díaz skilled as a nurse at a navy faculty, acquiring each a nursing diploma and a rank as an officer. After a number of stints at hospitals and clinics, she was employed in 2002 to work on the Miraflores presidential palace beneath Carmen Meléndez, a strong lady who’s now the mayor of the most important district of Caracas.

On June 19, 2024, this newspaper acquired an e mail from a person stating:

Expensive Sir or Madam
My title is Christian Ericsen. I’m bothering you to request the cancellation of the put up: https://weeklyblitz.internet/2023/08/29/hugo-chavez-nurse-secretly-stashes-gold-bars-in-europe.

Our causes for the request are:
The article is irrelevant.
Any sort of prosecution or conviction was dismissed
The topic of the article just isn’t a public determine skilled and customary fame continues to be been wrecked as by the inappropriate fashion of the article in order by the content material of it which has nothing frequent with the fact for the time being.

It additional mentioned:

I’m representing curiosity Ronnie Budja with articles on web assets.

I’m from Balkanian nation from ripoffremoval [Ripoff Report Removal] and that i ask you to take away this text out of your web site. I do know who’s Hugo Chavez and the way he’s authocracy broken all of Venezuela.

Our group of investigative journalists have discovered, sender of the e-mail has used a pretend title, whereas it’s well-anticipated that these emails may need been despatched by Ronnie Budja, and even by different accomplices of Claudia Díaz and her husband Adrián Velásquez particularly José Alcántara de la Torre.

Our reporters have additionally discovered particulars about Ripoff Report Removing on its web site, which claims to be “inexpensive fame administration” firm. There is no such thing as a contact tackle on this web site, besides a Gmail tackle. This entity is run by a person named Mike Munter.

On the web site, Mike Munter wrote, “I launched this web site in 2013 to service people and enterprise homeowners searching for high quality, results-based fame administration companies, with out busting the financial institution”.

This web site offers particulars of how they “suppress” or get articles faraway from Google stating, “We provide inexpensive elimination & suppression companies for unfavorable articles on information web sites, on-line newspapers, and blogs. This consists of our service to take away unfavorable information tales from Google”.

He additional wrote, “Once you contact the large gamers within the ORM house, you often wind up speaking to a gross sales particular person – somebody who just isn’t on the entrance strains, within the trenches doing the work. Their mission is to promote you, to not really perceive what your particular downside is and how you can greatest tackle it.

Once you contact us, you’ll be speaking to me or considered one of my companions who concentrate on getting outcomes daily”.

It means, the one who despatched e mail pretending as Christian Ericsen really is Mike Munter, as in line with our understanding, ‘Ripoff Report Removing’ is a one-man present.

Mike Muntar’s fame administration firm has an YouTube channel alongside accounts on different social media platforms such as LinkedIn, ‘X’ (previously often known as Twitter), Fb and Printerest. Based on its Fb web page, Mike Munter runs his actions from 9020 N Tyler Ave, Portland, Oregon, OR, United States. His cellphone quantity is: +1 503-890-6663.

Based on a report titled ‘Rampant use of Tumblr web site for submitting false copyright claims with Google beneath DMCA’, printed in Blitz on February 4, 2024, varied entities, together with organized crime rackets, criminals, scammers, fraudsters and even members of terrorist teams are randomly taking companies of ‘Status Administration’ corporations in getting current content material hyperlinks from Google search engine eliminated by submitting false copyright declare beneath the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), whereas these corporations use Tumblr for creating back-dated posts on this web site for his or her tried copyright claims. On a regular basis, a whole lot of such false copyright claims are being filed with Google by ‘Status Administration’ corporations thus dodging algorithms or Google’s bots by presenting pretend references to back-dated Tumblr posts.

It might be talked about right here that, on April 29, 2023, Blitz printed a report titled ‘Hugo Chávez nurse secretly stashes gold bars in Europe’ giving particulars of how Claudia Díaz, as soon as a nurse to Venezuelan chief Hugo Chávez, discovered herself embroiled in controversy as she ascended to a place overseeing the nation’s treasury.

Based on the report, which is predicated on info obtained from OCCRP, Claudia Díaz has been serving a time period in a US jail for cash laundering, investigators in Europe are delving into her hidden wealth. Nonetheless, it seems she wasn’t appearing alone.

Ronnie Budja and José Alcántara de la Torre, regardless of their differing backgrounds, share a covert hyperlink. Budja, aged 41, is a Swiss banker with a penchant for snowboarding and a residence in Monaco, whereas Alcántara de la Torre, aged 43 and initially from Venezuela, holds a Cypriot passport, resides in Paris, and holds a task in an acquisitions committee for London’s Tate Trendy museum.

These two seemingly unrelated males are related by a doc revealed by Liechtenstein prosecutors, granting them permission to take away quite a few gold bars from a hid vault. European authorities are actually investigating these bars, suspecting them to be a part of a cash laundering operation carried out by a former high-ranking Venezuelan official – the person in command of the nationwide treasury beneath President Hugo Chávez.

Claudia Patricia Díaz Guillén, who beforehand labored as a nurse, shortly climbed the ranks from taking the president’s temperature to managing billions of {dollars} in state funds. Although she stepped down after Chávez’s dying in 2013, it later emerged that she was considered one of many elite Venezuelans who amassed fortunes whereas depleting the nation’s wealth.

Earlier this yr, Díaz and her husband acquired a 15-year jail sentence from a US federal decide for accepting and laundering over US$136 million in bribes from a media mogul. The bribes got in change for preferential entry to bonds from the Venezuelan treasury. Regardless of the conviction, extra of her wealth stays undisclosed.

The origins of Díaz’s amassed fortune stay shrouded in thriller, however European investigators consider {that a} portion was funneled right into a Liechtenstein vault. Allegedly, an offshore firm related to Díaz bought 250 gold bars value US$9.5 million in 2014 and 2015. Subsequently, the gold was steadily bought between 2018 and 2019.

Whereas Díaz and her husband’s prosecution unveiled part of the story, extra info surfaced from a sentencing memo, indicating they have been “moreover in management” of serious belongings abroad.

The Liechtenstein investigation, initially reported by the Related Press, sheds mild on beforehand unknown associates – Ronnie Budja and José Alcántara de la Torre. Paperwork obtained by prosecutors counsel that Budja performed a pivotal position in managing the gold.

These two people, dwelling privileged lives in Europe, are but to be charged. Nonetheless, their involvement in aiding Díaz’s alleged cash laundering endeavors highlights the essential roles performed by accomplices in facilitating corrupt officers’ schemes.

As of now, there isn’t a remark from Budja’s attorneys, whereas requests for Alcántara de la Torre’s enter stay unanswered. Díaz’s attorneys additionally haven’t supplied a response. The investigation into Díaz and her associates stays ongoing, with extra info anticipated to emerge.

There have additionally been a number of studies within the worldwide media together with Related Press giving particulars of prevailing corruption in Venezuela.

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