On Monday, the Deputy Prosecutor's Office for Probity, Transparency, and Anti-Corruption (FAPTA) carried out a judicial operation in which the president of Social Security, Marta Esquivel-Rodriguez, was taken into custody along with seven high-ranking executives accused of involvement in a potential $239 million fraud.

According to the prosecutor's report, the operation included 28 raids on Social Security offices and suspects' homes as part of an investigation into alleged fraud crimes against the Public Treasury.

Agents from the Judicial Investigation Organization's Anti-Corruption Section conducted raids at the Social Security headquarters in downtown San José, as well as in several cantons including Escalante, Goicoechea, Coronado, Curridabat, Sabanilla, Moravia, Escazu, Santa Ana, Pavas, Tibas, and Desamparados, among others.

The raids resulted in the arrest of Esquivel, and additional suspects surnamed Camareno, Rojas, Gómez, Araya, Porras, Gutiérrez, and Quirós. These individuals served on the Social Security Board of Directors for 17 months, from February 2023 to July 2024.

The case claims that the defendants (who were members of the Social Security Board of Directors) annulled one agreement for choosing contractors for managing at least 138  public clinics known as Ebais.

The prosecutor's investigation found that after allegedly annulling the original agreement, the defendants used their board positions to create a new agreement to hire cooperatives that would benefit from the new contract.

The suspects allegedly changed the agreement despite being aware of a previous study that determined that the cooperatives that would be hired would result in an annual increase of more than $23.9 million per year in the current cost that Social Security pays to the private companies in charge of the Ebais managing.

Furthermore, the legal authorities suspect that members of the Board of Directors met with representatives from the cooperatives about to be hired.

The prosecution is also investigating the shift in the new businesses' contractual lengths, as the Costa Rica Public Procurement Law says that contracts cannot last longer than four years, while the new contract was signed for ten years.  The possible scheme against Social Security will be estimated at $239 million after ten years.

The polemic agreement included Ebais, or public clinics, in the cantons of Pavas, Desamparados, Santa Ana, Escazú, San Francisco, San Antonio, San Pablo, Barva, Tibás, La Carpio, León XIII, San Sebastián and Paso Ancho.

During the raids, the agents seized documents, computers, cell phones and other devices as part of the evidence in the case.

The suspects were taken to the Public Ministry in San José,  where they had to wait for a judge to order pre-trial prison indictments of the alleged crime of fraud against the Public Treasury.

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