Benito Jiménez/ Reform Agency
Monday, May 01, 2023 | 06:14
CDMX.- The Ministry of Public Function (SFP) is investigating the inexplicable wealth of a senior official responsible for the operation of Pemex pipelines.
This is Juan Francisco Rivera Cavazos, current corporate deputy director at Pemex Logística, and who, together with his wife, had inexplicable income of more than 13.3 million pesos between January 2014 and February 2019, additional money to the salaries and wages of both .
The SFP detected more than 500 deposits in the accounts of his wife, Blanca Yadira Compeán Arreaga, and the official himself.
In addition, the purchase of three luxury vehicles (Audi, BMW and Mercedes Benz) and the acquisition of a house in Escobedo, Nuevo León.
Rivera Cavazos was notified of the investigation against him in 2020 at his home in the Privadas de Anáhuac subdivision in Escobedo, but he did not attend any of the appointments.
In the period for which he is being investigated, Rivera Cavazos worked at Pemex as assistant manager of Pipeline Transportation, assistant manager of Pemex Logistics and Pemex Refining, manager of Pemex Logistics and deputy director of Pemex Logistics, according to file DG/DVPA/311/023 /2020 of the SFP and of which Grupo REFORMA has a copy.
That period coincides with the one in which, according to the Attorney General’s Office, General Eduardo León Trauwitz helped form an organization to steal fuel, while he was in charge of Pemex’s Strategic Safeguard sub-directorate.
On December 17, 2021, the soldier was captured in Vancouver, Canada, with a provisional arrest warrant for extradition purposes, although he was released from prison on March 14, 2022, after the British Columbia Court granted him his freedom. restricted.
In the case of Rivera Cavazos, sources close to the case confirm that he filed an amparo to avoid the process against him. In addition to the fact that he was sent to the Gas Bienestar operation “while the investigation continues.”
The federal investigation specifies that Rivera and his wife obtained income from wages and salaries of 10.3 million pesos between 2014 and 2019, but that they also received another 13.3 million from unknown sources.
Regarding the luxury vehicles purchased by Rivera, it is detailed that they are a 2018 MercedesBenz, with a value of 773,300 pesos, and a 2018 BMW X3 of 728,910 pesos, both purchased in December 2017, and whose payments the SFP could not relate to employee salaries.
Of the third vehicle, a 2015 Audi A4 Sport, with a value of 537,242 pesos, it was indicated that Rivera paid 413,900 for the car and that it is unknown how or who made the payment for the remaining 123,342 pesos.
The house purchased by both in 2015 in Escobedo cost 450,000 pesos and the payment could not be related to the couple’s bank accounts.
It controlled pipelines… and Huachicol went up
The theft of fuel through huachicoleo from Pemex increased with Juan Francisco Rivera Cavazos as the person in charge of the oil company’s pipeline operation.
Rivera Cavazos began as coordinator of the pipeline operation that crosses Nuevo León, Tamaulipas and Veracruz from 2006 to 2012.
During this period, clandestine intakes in Nuevo León increased 764 percent, going from 14 to 121 “pickets” to pipelines in the entity.
In the case of Veracruz, the findings of illegal intakes increased by 909 percent, going from 21 to 212, while in Tamaulipas they rose 5,600 percent, going from only 3 intakes in 2006 to 173 in 2012.
Then, between 2013 and 2022, Rivera Cavazos was assistant manager, manager and assistant director of Pipeline Transportation, Maintenance and Services. That is, responsible for the operation of the distribution system.
The “pickets” to the Pemex pipelines, at a national level, shot up in that period by 433 percent, going from 2,612 clandestine intakes -located mainly by the Army- to 13,946.
The decline is focused on Hidalgo, which closed 2022 with 5,779 pickets, the State of Mexico with 2,221, Puebla with 1,022, Tamaulipas with 775, Veracruz with 758, Jalisco with 613, Guanajuato with 590, Baja California with 440 and Nuevo León with 374 clandestine outlets.
hid patrimony
Rivera Cavazos made a career at Pemex since 2005, initially in Nuevo León, but he did not agree to make his patrimonial data public for at least 15 years.
In 2005, Rivera Cavazos was already coordinator of the Pipeline Operation in Monterrey at Pemex Refinación, but it was not until 2020 that he made his properties public.
According to the declaration of that year, already as deputy director of Pemex Logistics he received one million 829 thousand 814 pesos, that is, a net monthly salary of 152 thousand 484 pesos. He did not declare other income.
And just for the period as a public servant from 2014 to 2019, he is now being investigated for inexplicable enrichment of at least 13.3 million pesos in addition to his salaries at Pemex.
In his statements from 2020, he reports that in 2007 (two years after working at Pemex) he acquired a house of 186 square meters of construction with a value of one million 067 thousand pesos through a loan. He did not specify where.
Also in December 2017, he reported the cash acquisition of a 2018 Mercedes Benz with a value of 773 thousand 300 pesos.
In that 2020 statement, the official stated that he did not request loans in the previous year, nor did he have shares in companies or companies outside of Pemex; supports or benefits; clients, private benefits or trusts.
By 2021, Rivera’s take-home pay increased to 221,000 pesos a month. In that year he said that he had an income of 146 thousand pesos for commercial or business reasons. He cited the same car and the same house.
In his last statement, from 2022, Rivera’s net salary dropped to 149,000 pesos per month, although he reported that he had additional income of 154,619 pesos for commercial or business reasons.
There he also stated that he had the same Mercedes Benz vehicle and the same property.
According to the Transparent Payroll site, Rivera receives a net monthly salary of 116,503 pesos as Corporate Deputy Director of Pemex Logistics.
He has also attended the morning conferences of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to talk about the huachicol and clandestine shots.
On January 21, 2019, already as deputy director of Transportation at Pemex Logística, he was called to explain the process of milking fuel by the huchicoleros.
This after the explosion in Tlahuelilpan, in Hidalgo state, in which 137 people died.
He detailed why the milkers failed.
“Here we show some valves that we have been detecting, repairing in different states of the Republic, attending clandestine outlets.
“These valves are bronze valves for low pressure, 150 pounds per square inch, and that has generated a large number of clandestine controlled intakes because they are not the specifications that have to be used,” Rivera explained.
He showed the topographic profile of the Tuxpan-Tula pipeline, the municipalities it crosses in Veracruz, Puebla and Hidalgo -one of the most perforated by organized crime- to exemplify the risk that Pemex technicians have in case of spills or fires to disable a clandestine drink.
“I will tell you something very interesting: Tula is located at 2,161 meters above sea level, the clandestine takeover that concerns us is at 2,67 meters above sea level, there is a difference of 94 meters.
“At the time of the fire, there was Pemex Premium, which has a specific weight and when multiplied by 94 meters gives us the column pressure that was at the point, which is almost seven kilograms per square centimeter. So that’s what we are faced with. that day; despite the fact that the pipeline is suspended, there was a significant pressure of seven kilos that we would have to control in order to put out the fire,” he commented then.
