In 2011, while serving as comptroller, Sandra Morelli decided to suspend the governor of Caldas. Today, thirteen years later, it has been revealed that this decision lacked foundation. It has been determined that “the measure was not necessary” and that it was, in fact, “disproportionate.” This decision seriously, gravely, and immediately affected the rights of Governor Mario Aristizábal Muñoz, according to Magistrate Alberto Montaña Plata of the Council of State. Consequently, last month, that court ordered the General Comptroller's Office to compensate the former governor. Aristizábal Muñoz was suspended in September 2011, and since his term ended later that year, he could not return to office.

Comptroller Morelli justified the suspension by alleging possible evidence tampering in a fiscal investigation. However, the Council of State concluded that this position was not reasonable. “Although evidence tampering was suggested, the Comptroller's Office did not present the proper and sufficient arguments or evidence to reach that conclusion,” said the court. In other words, the comptroller acted arbitrarily.

Aristizábal Muñoz had to wait thirteen years for the justice system to recognize that he was the victim of an improper act. Before becoming governor, he had been a city councilman and, for much of his life, dedicated himself to coffee production and export, like his family. He said he filed the lawsuit to clear his name and defend himself against the stigmatization he suffered. Furthermore, he highlighted that his case—which caused distress for him, his children, and his nine siblings, as well as bank embargoes and blacklisting—is just one of many politicized rulings issued by control agencies.

Other lawsuits are pending in the administrative courts and the Council of State against abusive acts by the then-comptroller. However, this is the first ruling that confirms Morelli issued an illegal administrative act. The ruling, which consists of only 18 pages, is historic: it clearly and definitively establishes that the former comptroller acted outside the legal framework. The fiscal investigation was initiated over an amendment to the lottery contract between Susuerte S.A. and the Departmental Health Company (EDSA). However, as demonstrated in the Council of State’s case file, the governor didn’t even attend the EDSA board meeting where that amendment was approved. The Comptroller's Office will have to pay Aristizábal 107 million pesos, which is equivalent to the salaries he missed, material damages, and lost earnings.

Despite Morelli's extensive academic background—she studied law at the Universidad Externado de Colombia, specialized in administrative law, completed postgraduate studies in Bologna, Paris, and Montpellier, taught law at the Externado, directed the doctoral law program and the public law department, and served as legal director of the National Federation of Coffee Growers for nearly ten years—her actions in this case demonstrated a clear violation of the law. She did not act in accordance with the law but instead deviated from it, as declared by the highest court responsible for judging public officials who issue illegal acts.

This ruling also carries a moral disqualification for Morelli. In 2010, the Council of State's Plenary Chamber selected Dr. Morelli as its candidate for the shortlist for Comptroller. Congress ultimately chose her from that shortlist. Therefore, it was the Council of State that catapulted Morelli into the position of comptroller. That decision by the Plenary Chamber implied trust in her legal expertise and her adherence to the law. Recently, Morelli submitted her resume to the same Council of State to apply for the position of Attorney General, but she was not selected. In 2010, her name held prestige; in 2024, it is discredited. The abuses she committed in the Comptroller's Office betray the trust that the Council of State placed in her in 2010. Academic credentials are not enough if they are not accompanied by honor, integrity, and righteousness. She is not Enrique Low Murtra, the distinguished and deserving jurist, magistrate, and minister.