by proldic » Thu Aug 04, 2005 2:13 pm
Judge Blamed for Mishandling Probe of 1994 Jewish Center Bombing Removed From Post<br><br>BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) - A federal judge who had spent years investigating the July 1994 terrorist bombing of the main Jewish community center here was ordered to be formally removed from his post Wednesday by authorities claiming irregularities in his probe. <br>A judicial review board that oversees the performance of Argentina's federal judges said it had evidence of 13 irregularities in Judge Jose Galeano's probe of the 1994 bombing that killed 85 people, wounded more than 200 and leveled the Jewish community center...<br> <br>Galeano took charge of the investigation in 1995 and was removed from the case in December 2003 amid rising complaints that no substantial headway had been made. <br><br>In 2004, about a dozen former police officers and an accused trafficker in stolen vehicles were subsequently acquitted of charges they had formed a "local connection" in the bombing. After those acquittals, critics including Jewish leaders called for the formal removal of Galeano from his judgeship. <br><br>Galeano...has said repeatedly that he was innocent of accusations of misconduct. <br><br>Although Jewish community leaders and others have cast suspicion on Middle East terrorists, no mastermind has ever been found and the lack of progress has sown years of bitterness among victims and their families. <br><br>The attack that leveled the community center in downtown Buenos Aires was the worst terrorist attack on Argentine soil and shook a more than 200,000-strong Jewish community here, one of the largest in Latin America. An earlier bombing destroyed the Israeli embassy in 1992, killing 29 people. The earlier bombing also remains unsolved. <br><br>The Associated Press <br>Published: Aug 3, 2005 <br><br> <p></p><i></i>
