31/07/2026 21:23 - Judiciales
In a significant move for institutional transparency, suspended federal judge Gastón Salmain was formally charged on July 31, 2026. Federal prosecutor Federico Reynares Solari charged him with aggravated bribery (known locally as cohecho), malfeasance (prevaricato), and failure to fulfill his duties as a public official.
To provide local context, Salmain is a federal judge in Rosario, Argentina's third-largest city. He is accused of attempting to take over the criminal cases of the former regional director of the AFIP (Administración Federal de Ingresos Públicos, Argentina's equivalent of the IRS), Carlos Vaudagna. The prosecutor detailed that Salmain allegedly demanded a $100,000 bribe to resolve Vaudagna's cases favorably. This bribery attempt reportedly took place between September and November 2024.
Investigations revealed that Salmain did not act alone. He allegedly used lawyer Diego Feser—a media group executive and board member of the local newspaper La Capital—as an intermediary. Feser was reportedly tasked with offering Vaudagna influence over the case file FRO 16727/2023.
The prosecutor emphasized that even though the payment was never finalized, the mere demand for a bribe constitutes a crime. At the time, Salmain was a civil judge authorized to substitute in criminal courts. He first declared himself incompetent to handle the case and later claimed jurisdiction, a move the prosecution views as a strategy to drive up the bribe's price.
The prosecution's case rests on compelling evidence. A forensic analysis of Vaudagna's iPhone recovered a deleted chat with Gastón Salmain, consisting of 48 messages exchanged between December 22, 2018, and May 9, 2019. This proved a prior relationship between the two that the judge had failed to disclose, in addition to revealing that Salmain had asked Vaudagna for a public job for his partner.
The case took an unexpected turn while investigating whether the judge was directing social security cases. Security cameras installed for the probe captured Salmain meeting with Feser on August 4, 2025, just one day before Salmain issued a ruling favorable to the lawyer's media outlets.
At the end of the hearing, Salmain rejected the accusations, claiming he neither asked for nor received money. He stated he is facing persecution driven from the highest levels of the Argentine Supreme Court, mentioning Chief Justice Horacio Rosatti, and requested testimony from Justice Ricardo Lorenzetti. Because Argentine judges possess fueros (a constitutional judicial immunity protecting them from arrest while in office), Judge Román Lanzón denied the prosecutor's request for preventive detention. However, Lanzón forwarded the proceedings to the Council of the Magistracy, which has already initiated a political trial (impeachment) that could remove Salmain from the bench in less than 180 working days, reinforcing the commitment to a fair and clean justice system.
Sources: La Política Online, La Nación, La Capital, RTS Medios, and El Ciudadano.
Alfredo S. Quiroga
