Kueider money laundering case: San Martín court declares itself incompetent and transfers case to Buenos Aires
Federal Oral Court No. 5 of San Martín ruled that it lacks competence to hear the money laundering case linked to the Kueider case and referred it to Federal Justice in Buenos Aires.
San Martín court cedes Kueider case to Federal Justice in Buenos Aires
Federal Oral Criminal Court No. 5 of San Martín ruled on 7 October that it lacks territorial competence to hear the money laundering case linked to the Kueider case and ordered it to be referred to Federal Justice in Buenos Aires City. According to cndigital.com.ar, the ruling does not imply any acquittal nor does it invalidate the investigation carried out; rather, it determines which court should conduct the trial.
The ruling responds to a strictly territorial matter. Although the case had been linked for years to a broader investigation being handled in San Martín, the judges concluded that none of the specific acts included in the accusation occurred in that jurisdiction. The central elements of the accusation instead point to Buenos Aires City.
The alleged facts and the accused
The accusation describes an organisation which, according to the Public Prosecutor's office, would have conducted operations over several years intended to give the appearance of legality to money of illicit origin. Among the alleged facts are real estate operations in Paraná for more than 41 million pesos, the acquisition of a Chevrolet Trailblazer vehicle, money movements through bank accounts and the use of commercial entities as structures to conceal the origin of the funds.
The accusation also mentions alleged falsely documented loans, allegedly false balance sheets and the use of private instruments considered to be forged. These funds, moreover, would be linked to possible prior crimes of corruption: bribery, negotiations incompatible with the exercise of public functions and violation of the duties of a public official.
Among the accused are Juan Carlos Nogueras, Ernesto Javier Rubel, Rodolfo Daniel González, Adriana Cecilia Crucitta, Gabriela Patricia Saint Pierre and Débora María Ferreyra, as well as the companies Nopor Service, Lectus, Vía SNP Logística, Felsir Biotecnología and Vijusa Industrial Argentina. The accusation also mentions Edgardo Kueider and Iara Guinsel Costa, although the procedural status of both remained linked to other proceedings, including an extradition process.
The territorial map that tipped the balance
To support its decision, the court reconstructed the accusation as if tracing a geographical map of the facts. The real estate operations would have occurred in Paraná; the purchase of the vehicle, in Concordia; part of the documentary manoeuvres was prepared in an accounting office in Quilmes; and the bank accounts used for the circulation of money were linked to a branch of that Buenos Aires locality.
The decisive point was the company Betail, considered one of the central pieces of the accusation. The company had its registered office in Buenos Aires City; its offices were searched there, the relevant corporate acts for the case took place there and the General Inspection of Justice, before which those acts were registered and publicised, was located there.
The territorial route thus spans Paraná, Concordia, Quilmes, Berazategui and Buenos Aires. San Martín does not appear at any point in that route, and that absence was decisive for the judges to cede the case.
The procedural history: from the ENERSA case to the elevation to trial
The procedural trajectory of the case is more complex. The investigation that reached the Oral Court of San Martín was related to another of broader scope, known as the "ENERSA case", which investigates possible improper payments linked to the Securitas Group and officials of the state energy company of Entre Ríos. Securitas' head office was located in Munro—Vicente López District—and from there, according to that investigation, operations developed at various points in the country would have been coordinated.
During the investigation stage, Federal Justice in San Martín had rejected motions to transfer the case to another jurisdiction, on the grounds that the facts could not be analysed as isolated episodes. The Federal Court of Appeals of San Martín upheld that position in April 2025 and emphasised that separating the ENERSA episode from the rest of the investigation could artificially fragment the case and generate parallel investigations into a single structure.
The Court also highlighted reasons of procedural economy: if the facts were connected, investigating them from a single location avoided duplications and contradictory decisions.
The moment that changed the rules of the process
For the Oral Court, the elevation to trial marks a decisive difference compared to the investigation stage. Whilst a case remains open, the criminal hypothesis can be broadened or incorporate new connections. But when the Public Prosecutor's office presents the elevation to trial request, the object of the process becomes delimited: the facts, the accused and the crimes that must be tried are established.
At that point, the court argues, the logic of connection that justified keeping the case in San Martín during the investigation loses its basis. The need to investigate a web as a whole does not permit, at the trial stage, maintaining the case before a court that lacks territorial competence over the specific facts that were elevated. The case must therefore proceed before Federal Justice in Buenos Aires City.
Source: Google News AR — Buenos Aires