A few days after Liliana Laserna and her partner, Camilo Fidel Pinzón Gómez, were detained, Liliana underwent psychological and psychiatric evaluations that would determine the health of her mental state.
The World Health Organization’s guide for psyhological evaulations sets standards for various severe mental disorders including schizophrenia, delirium, schizoaffective, bipolar, and depressive disorders.
Liliana’s mental health state was always a topic of concern for her mother, Mrs. Liliana Jaramillo. She was also among the people who disapproved of Liliana living with her partner, Camilo Fidel.
Following the death of Liliana’s father, Mario Laserna Pinzón, his five children entered a fierce battle for the plentiful assets of the inheritance. This also worried Mrs. Liliana as she wanted to protect her daughter’s worth, especially since she did not trust in Camilo Fidel’s true intentions.
As a result, Mrs. Liliana Jaramillo required that Camilo Fidel sign a pre-nuptial agreement, which stated that he would renounce any claim to Liliana’s wealth despite the fact that the two were living together. And so it happened.
Colombian legislation permits the emergence of an asset-holding company in the case that a couple has been living together for more than two years. The case must abide by two requisites: singularity and permanence. Singularity refers to the faithfulness of the relationship and permanence refers to the fact that they must be living together, as the name suggests, permanently, without any interruptions or prologed breaks.
Asset-holding companies or of permanent partners depend a lot on the time when they were registered in the public record and how they were redacted.
The disputes among the Laserna Jaramillos for the family’s inheritance were further exacerbated when Liliana’s brother, Juan Mario Laserna, died in a traffic accident upon losing control of his vehicle. At the moment of his death in July of 2016, Juan Mario Laserna was divorced in the United States from his American ex-wife, Christine Balling, with who he did not have children. The bulk of capital in good, actions, and dividends that Juan Mario left behind were being disputed by his ex-wife, his mother, and his sisters.
Liliana’s brother left behind a multi-million dollar wealth, as was reported by El Espectador in April of 2017. The wealth of a man who had been a senator and co-director of the country’s treasury was calculated to be around 20 billion Colombian pesos; the equivalent of almost 7 million USD.
That same article describes a legal mess which included an alleged fake divorce certificate between Laserna and Balling in Colombia, and supposed stolen property during the division of joint goods.
This legal dispute is still ongoing. The Laserna Jaramillo sisters are awaiting a definitive decision from the courts that would establish that the ex-wife has no claim to Juan Mario Laserna’s inheritance.
Once the divorced is legalized in Colombia, the next stage would be to divide assets among the sisters, a process that would significantly increase the value of Liliana Laserna and her three sisters’ inheritance. An inheritance that already includes the valuable fortune of their mother, Mrs. Liliana Jaramillo, who died at the age of 84 in the outskirts of Ibagué in June of 2017.
By that time, Liliana will have already lost a brother, her father, her mother, and her only daughter. She was suffering from depression. The only things she had left were her partner, Camilo Fidel, and a fortune in goods.
The family did not even have time to catch a breath when they found out that, four months after the death of their mother and less than a year after the presumed death of Jesseca Helene, on October 30, 2017 during public hearing #2294 in the 8th Notary of Bogotá, María Liliana Laserna Jaramillo, age 61 to the date, named Camilo Fidel Pinzón Gómez the only heir universally of her entire estate.
(click here to read the full testimony)
The open testimony from María Liliana Laserna to Camilo Fidel states: “…of single marital status, with no established marital union, who finds themselves within the total capacity of their mental faculties, and representing themselves: manifested that their wish and final will is to declare by menas of this public OPEN TESTIMONY containing the follow stipulations:”
Among the stipulations are those of conjugal and civil status; two points where Liliana establishes that “I was never married, nor have I lived in Civil Union, thus I am not, to the date, part of any Asset-Holding Company.” The following parragraph continues, “My current civil status is single with no marital union and I do no have children from within a marriage, extramaritally, or adopted.”
In the testamentary dispositions one can read: “Since I find myself in total and complete use of my mental faculties it is my will to declare by means of this public statement, adhering to all relevant laws, my testimony and I manifest that it is my desire that this be be taken as the expression of my final and deliberated will and that is how it shall be decreed.”
The testimony has a first and only section that reads: “I assign as the only heri to my entire estate, universally, mister: CAMILO FIDEL PINZÓN GÓMEZ, of legal adult age, neighbor and resident of the Municipality of Sesquilé (Cundinamarca), identified with the cédula (ID) of citizenship No. 79.865.650 expidited in Bogotá D.C. on the day 08 of August of 1995.”
Additionally, the document contains a description of all the assets existing at the moment that the testimony was written. Among the assets are a piece of land in Ibagué, an apartment in one of the best residential zones of Bogotá, and several other lots that make up the ranch where Liliana and Camilo Fidel were living in Sesquilé up until they were detained by the authorities.
By declaring her partner as the only universal heir of her entire estate, Camilo Fidel will have access to the entire inheritance that Liliana will receive from her mother, and also any assets that she may inherit from Juan Mario Laserna once the situation concerning her brother’s divorce is resolved.
This testimony will go into effect upon Liliana’s death and, according to experts, nullifies the pre-nuptial agreement Camilo Fidel had signed in which he renounced any claim to Liliana Laserna’s assets in the event of a liquidation.
In this case, Camilo Fidel will receive all of Liliana Laserna’s goods during a legal process as has been stated and determined by the testimony.
Among Liliana’s friends and family there is a lot of concern regarding what the testament implies, especially considering the pain and suffering that Liliana has suffered following the loss of her daughter and considering her mental health. Some have even begun pursuing legal action in order to nullify the testimony and gain the ability to sell off her estate.
They will try to prove that, among other things, Liliana Laserna was not in full control of her faculties at the moment that the testimony was signed.
If the testimony was conceived under false pretenses due to error, manipulation, or deceit then it will be rendered fraudulent. Considering the mental state of the signer, the Laserna Jaramillo sisters could present a case before a judge in Family Court. With a decision from an mental health expert – a psychiatrist or neurologist, for example – they would have to prove that Liliana is not capable of managing her estate or to qualify herself as capable. By these means, the family could nullify the testimony.
According to the District Attorney’s investigation, Camilo Fidel Pinzón Gómez’s defense plans to prove that their client has mental health disorders in order to evade judicial proceedings and avoid being found guilty of the forced disappearance for which he is being accused.
For now, neither of the two have given official statements regarding the trial; despite that both parties plead innocent.
Witnesses claim that Liliana met Camilo Fidel’s Venezuelan mistress during the initial proceedings before a judge in Zipaquirá; where the case is filed. Even after finding out about Camilo Fidel’s secret relationship, Liliana Laserna, seeming not to care, gave her support to her supposed partner.
Regarding Jesseca Helene, the most recent description obtained by the investigators was that the daughter was very thin and appeared malnourished. A condition that the investigators were able to confirm by examining the last photos that Liliana Laserna had of her daughter on her phone.
If they find out that the girl’s body was, in fact, incinerated, unless the parties responsible for Jesseca Helene confess, investigators believe it to be unlikely that they will ever know how the girl lost her life.
The one thing we do know to be true is what was said about Liliana Laserna by one of the investigators to the man who anticipated this whole tragedy: “You saved her life.”
