JUSTICE · CAUSE SHARED DREAMS

⚖️ The postponement of definitions in the "Shared Dreams" case

The Federal Oral Court 5 moved the verdict that was to be known this Friday to Monday, just one day before the deadline that the prosecutor's office considers the deadline for the statute of limitations for the case for alleged fraud in the housing program of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Foundation.

This Friday's hearing in the courts of Comodoro Py was destined to close fifteen years of judicial proceedings. Judges Adriana Palliotti, Daniel Obligado and Adrián Grünberg were to hear the last words of the nine defendants and, then, announce the verdict on the alleged diversion of public funds in the social housing construction program administered by the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Foundation.

However, unexpectedly, the TOF5 decided to divide the final statements of the defendants into two hearings. Only Sergio Schoklender was heard this Friday; the rest of the defendants who had not yet spoken – Daniel Alfredo Nasif, Silvia Karina Nasif, Claudio Freidin and Carlos Castellano – will do so only on Monday. The verdict, therefore, was set for that same day.

A judicial source linked to the file explained the court's criterion with a brief sentence: it is a complex case, with documentation that needs to be reviewed before defining responsibilities. By postponing the final words, the judges secured the two days of the weekend to advance in the deliberation, since the procedural code requires that the sentence be issued immediately after the closing of those presentations.

The postponement is not a minor procedural detail: it reopens the possibility, already latent since the beginning of the debate, that the case is extinguished by the passage of time before there is a final sentence. The crime of fraudulent administration of public funds – the one investigated by this file – prescribes after six years, and that period runs from the last procedural act that interrupted it.

This is where the central discussion that runs through the final stretch of the trial arises. The defenses maintain that the criminal action has already been extinguished, because they take as a starting point the first summons to trial, made in July 2020. Prosecutor Diego Velasco, on the other hand, maintains that that first summons was annulled and that the count should begin only with the second summons, dated September 15, 2020. Under this interpretation, the six-year term expires next Tuesday, September 15, 2026.

With the verdict now set for Monday 14, the court is just one day away from that deadline according to the reading of the prosecution, which keeps the parties on tenterhooks and raises questions about what would happen if, for whatever reason, the reading of the sentence suffered a new setback.

The file reached this final instance with nine people in the dock, all of them protected by the presumption of innocence until there is a final sentence. Prosecutor Velasco, together with his colleague Argibay, asked for maximum sentences differentiated according to the role that each one would have had in the scheme of diversion of funds.

REQUESTS FOR PUNISHMENT FROM THE PROSECUTOR'S OFFICE

For Julio De Vido, an eventual conviction would imply his sixth sentence in corruption cases, a fact that the judicial chronicle itself highlights as part of the pattern surrounding the former minister. Hebe de Bonafini, historic president of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Foundation, was also among the original defendants, but her death in November 2022 extinguished the criminal action against her.

Sergio Schoklender was the only defendant who made use of his right to the last word this Friday. He thanked the work of his defenders and vindicated the social scope of the housing program that he administered together with his brother Pablo. He also launched an indirect criticism of former President Cristina Kirchner, today sentenced to six years in prison in the Vialidad case, by distancing himself from the phrase with which she appealed to history during her inquiry in that file.

Pablo Schoklender, José López, Julio De Vido and Abel Fatala, on the other hand, chose not to make use of their right to speak on this first day. Their peers Daniel Alfredo Nasif, Silvia Karina Nasif, Claudio Freidin and Carlos Castellano will have their turn on Monday, immediately before the court announces the ruling.

"Shared Dreams" is the name of the social housing construction program that, between the mid-2000s and the beginning of 2010, was carried out by the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Foundation with public funds transferred directly, without going through the control mechanisms provided for in the Public Works Law. The operational administration of the program was in the hands of the brothers Sergio and Pablo Schoklender, incorporated into the foundation despite their criminal records for a parricide committed in 1981.

The case began in 2011, after a series of journalistic investigations that exposed a standard of living that was difficult to justify with the income declared by the foundation's representatives. The prosecution maintains that around 20% of the budget allocated to the program would have been diverted to a network of companies and luxury goods.

The investigation first fell to the court of then-federal judge Norberto Oyarbide, whose handling of the file was questioned for its slowness before being removed. It was only in May 2019 that federal judge Marcelo Martínez de Giorgi closed the investigation stage and elevated the case to oral trial. Even so, the debate took almost seven more years to begin, delayed by incidents of the defenses, complex accounting expertise, the covid-19 pandemic and the late integration of the court.

🕰️ Chronology of the file

The trial is taking place in a different scenario from that of the gestation of the program: the government of Javier Milei has publicly pointed to the case as an example of uncontrolled public management during the years of Kirchnerism, while sectors linked to human rights organizations warn of the risk that these political readings confuse the specific actions of former representatives of the foundation with the historical trajectory of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo as an organization. The case is advancing, in any case, independently of this interpretative dispute: it is the judges of the TOF5 who must resolve, in the coming days, both the substantive issue and the statute of limitations.

✅ Conviction before the expiration: if the court issues a verdict on Monday the 14th, one day before the deadline maintained by the prosecution, the case would have a sentence and the discussion about the statute of limitations would be settled in the facts.

⚠️ Declaration of Statute of Limitations: If the court endorses the position of the defenses on the date of the start of the count, it could declare the criminal action extinguished for part or all of the defendants.

🚨 New procedural setback: any additional delay would leave the outcome practically on the deadline of Tuesday 15, with the risk of reopening the debate on the validity of a sentence issued after the deadline.

KEY FACTS

ANNEX FOR DIGITAL PUBLICATION

Optimization recommendations for traditional search engines and response engines with artificial intelligence (SEO + GEO/AEO), designed for a judicial news of high interest and constant updating.

Photographs of coverage of court hearings such as this are, in general, journalistic material with reserved rights of each media and photographer. That is why they are not reproduced here as an archive, but as an absolute verified link to the original article, so that the material can be consulted and, if reused, the corresponding license can be requested, always citing the source and author.

🖼️ LA NACION — Photograph of Sergio Schoklender at the hearing on 9/11/2026 (credit: Ricardo Pristupluk)

Original article verified and active at the time of this publication · Photo credit: Ricardo Pristupluk / LA NACION

🔗 Infobae — Coverage of the postponement of the verdict (11/9/2026)

Additional source for contrast and data verification

Production note: due to network restrictions of the environment in which this document was generated, it was not possible to download and embed binaries of external images within the .docx. Absolute and verified links are left; it is recommended to manage the editorial use license before inserting any photograph in a final publication.

Fifteen years after the investigation began, the "Shared Dreams" case reaches its final stretch literally against the clock. The decision of the TOF5 to stretch the schedule to the limit makes Monday, September 14 a hinge date: that day will be known both the last words of the missing defendants and the verdict that will define whether there was a crime, who is responsible and if the passage of time ended up playing in favor of any of the defendants. All this, on the eve of a Tuesday the 15th that the prosecutor's office marked in red as the limit of the statute of limitations.

Close