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The Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court has annulled for lack of sufficient reasoning the sentence of the National Court, of October 14, 2020, which acquitted José Miguel Latasa Guetaria, alias “Fermín”, and José Antonio López Ruiz, alias “Kubati” , of an attack that cost the lives of two civil guards perpetrated on July 26, 1986 in Arechavaleta (Guipúzcoa).
The Supreme thus considers the appeal of the relative of one of the deceased guards, as a private accusation, and orders the National High Court to issue a new sentence that respects the fundamental right to effective judicial protection, violated by the lack of a sufficient explanation of the acquittals.
The sentence, of which the magistrate Julián Sánchez Melgar has been rapporteur, emphasizes that the central issue of the appeal of the private accusation is to consider the argument of the Court illogical when it rules out that the accused could intervene in two attacks committed in a short period of time in Ordizia and Arechavaleta,
the latter, that of this cause. Both were committed by means of explosive devices equipped with timers between 10:30 p.m. on July 25, 1986 and three in the morning the following day, July 26. For the first they were convicted.
Traces of the acquitted
for the Supreme It is significant that two middle finger prints were found on the tube used in the Arechavaleta attack. left finger of Latasa and one of the left index finger of López Ruiz, “which is undoubtedly an indication that proves the participation of Latasa and López Ruiz in the placement or transport of the launching tubes stationed in a tree and placed in a rudimentary way”.
“The issue – the Supreme Court points out – is that the trial court does not reason why such an indication, of undoubted supporting intensity, in order to the criminal participation of the accused, does not serve to reach such a purpose, an aspect in which the appealed judgment does not make a plot that can be taken as reasonable.
The ruling adds that the Court says that it is “unlikely” that the two defendants participated in the Ordizia attack and then in the Arechavaleta attack, but that does not explain why, limiting itself to pointing out that certain extremes have not been proven, «but neither does it justify such an assertion, it is limited to its affirmation, and this «despite the expertise exposed»».
Collaboration was not valued
For the Supreme Court, it is striking that the National Court did not even consider the possibility that both ETA members could “collaborate” with the attack, “without even needing to be present in Arechavaleta, cooperation as essential as the contribution of the explosive material or the tools used in its execution«. Therefore, the criminal participation of the accused was not assessed, deduced from the proven fact of their intervention in the preparation of the instruments with which the attack was carried out.
“It is not explained either in the appealed sentence why it discards in its discursive development, something that is a plausible hypothesis of the participation of the accused, while the preparation of both attacks took place between 10:30 p.m. on July 25. and 3:00 a.m. on July 26, including travel (4 hours and 30 minutes). Nothing is said either about whether it was preposterous to think, as the accusations revealed, that they had more than enough time for the placement, by the accused, that let’s not forget they are experienced terrorists (they had already been convicted repeatedly for it), of explosive devices in both locations between those hours, and taking into consideration for the authorship trial that timers were placed to execute the act in advance, “adds the sentence.
In the same way, it underlines that it does not explain how, if in the judgment under appeal it is said that it takes about 35-45 minutes to go from one town to another, why they would not have had time to carry out both actions, once their fingerprints appeared on the instruments used for their executiontaking into account that the Court itself acknowledges that they could have moved to Arechavaleta and placed the artifacts when it says: “… it is true that, due to the geographical distance, and the passage of time (just over three hours), they could later move to the town of Arechavaleta to commit the action now prosecuted.
For all this, the Chamber indicates that the sentence must be repeated by the same magistrates to carry out the necessary explanations “in a way that satisfies the right to effective judicial protection” and the judgment of authorship in these actions can be resolved.
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism