Death of a Prosecutor

By: Georgina Buckley

Alberto Nisman, an Argentine federal prosecutor, was found dead on January 18, 2015.[1] His cause of death, a single gunshot wound to the head, is still being investigated. In 1994, Nisman investigated the bombing of the Asociacion Mutual Israelita Argentina in Buenos Aires.[2] The car bombing killed 85 people at the Jewish community center. Nisman had been scheduled to testify before the Argentinian Congress the day after his death about the links he had found between President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and Iranian officials tied to the 1994 bombing. To complicate matters, a 26 page arrest document charging President Kirchner and foreign minister Hector Timerman was found in a trash can in Nisman’s home. Nisman had long harbored suspicions that Kirchner and Timerman had secretly negotiated with Iran to lift international arrest warrants for the Iranian officials responsible for the bombing.  Nisman also accused Kirchner and Timerman of trying to dismantle his investigation. As it stands, the arrest warrant would not have been effective as both Kirchner and Timerman have immunity.[1] They could only be arrested upon a judge’s authorization and request to Congress to lift immunity.

The Argentinian media is alleging a conspiracy to kill Nisman and silence him while President Kirchner allegedly suggested his death was part of a plot meant to falsely implicate her administration. Relations with the Jewish community in Buenos Aires have further been antagonized by a rash of anti-Semitic posters appearing in early January around the city. Regardless of why Nisman died, the fact that he drafted the arrest warrant has troubling implications for the relationship between the government and the government’s own legal system in Argentina.

Georgina Buckley is a 3L at The Pennsylvania State University–The Dickinson School of Law, and a Senior Editor on the Journal of Law and International Affairs.

---

[1] Simon Romero, Draft of Arrest Request for Argentine President Found at Dead Prosecutor’s Home, 2015 The New York Times, Feb. 3, 2015 at A3 (2015) available at http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/04/world/americas/argentina-prosecutor-alberto-nisman-arrest-warrant-cristina-de-kirchner.html?_r=0.

[2] Associated Press, Jewish Centre Bombing: Argentine Prosecutor Nisman Found Dead, 2015 BBC News, Jan. 19, 2015 at 1 (2015) available at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-30877296.