The accused told the prosecutor how the parliamentary office of ex-deputy Lavín became an electoral call center

An imputed individual appeared before prosecutors to describe how the parliamentary office of former deputy Joaquín Lavín transformed into an election call centre. The former deputy Joaquín Lavín León made his second formal appearance before authorities, facing new charges linked to a case led by prosecutor Oriente Constanza Encina. Previously charged with fraud, forgery, misuse of commercial private instruments, and abuse of influence, the prosecutor added accusations of misuse of electoral data against him. In this thread of the case, the Public Prosecutor’s Office is investigating the former member of the UDI alongside IT specialist Felipe Vásquez over the creation and use of the platform “SocialTazk” to manage candidate databases with the aim of sending text messages promoting electoral campaigns. According to prosecutors, these activities were funded by Congress and constituted improper use of the voter registry. During the mentioned hearing, held on July 8th before the Seventh Court of Guarantee, other accused individuals were formally charged, including Shigue Ogino, who had previously worked in the territorial office of the former congressman and was later placed under total home detention following his indictment. Two days prior to the appearance, Ogino decided to waive his right to remain silent and testified before prosecutor Encina, revealing the working methods within the office of the former parliamentarian and the mechanisms used to contact UDI candidates to obtain their databases. Assisted by his lawyer, the accused recounted that he joined the work with the then-deputy while he was still studying and during a period of financial pressure. He stated that he was introduced to Arnaldo Dominguez, who served as a close advisor to Lavín. “I gave me the contact of Arnaldo Domínguez and I met with him. This initial meeting took place at the beginning of October 2020. Arnaldo Domínguez told me that initially the work I would carry out would be territorial. This communication was verbal. After this meeting, I accepted the job and was promised a sum of 500 thousand pesos. In addition to this amount, there was a payment of 25 thousand pesos for a mobile phone, since I needed it for my activities. It was indicated that the workplace would be in the district office of Deputy Lavín León in Maipú,” he explained. According to his version, his duties were “to call candidates for mayor to offer them the use of the Socialtazk platform.” Joaquín Lavín Infante spoke after visiting his son in prison. “This work consisted of the following: Romina Molina or Arnaldo Domínguez sent me database files with numbers of candidates to whom I should call, request meetings via Zoom for training, and tell them that in these trainings they would learn to use the Socialtazk platform, create users, and upload contacts from each candidate's database. Additionally, if the candidate had many databases and it was too much work for them, we could ask them for those databases so that people working for the Chamber of Deputies in the district office could enter them. Ilse Palma and Irene Vera,” he continued. According to Ogino's account, all coordination within the office of the deputy was led by Arnaldo Domínguez, who paid salaries and received direct instructions from the deputy. Furthermore, he clarified that “the assignment of my calling targets and tasks I had to perform, I received them from Romina Molina, who was the right hand of Arnaldo Domínguez.” Given that he faced health issues at one point, he confessed to the prosecutor that he requested Dominguez to have a formal employment contract made, so he could access Fonasa. As he stated, this was done through the Chamber of Deputies. “On January 20th, 2021, he sent me via WhatsApp the contract that would be made for the Chamber of Deputies, for a period of...”