The process has 51 Defendants, 41 people, men and women and 10 Business, and the defenses of 13 defendants who appealed the accusation will seek to demonstrate the innocence of their clients and seek their release.
For a year, nine months and twenty-nine days the case was processed at the Central Criminal Instruction Court (TCIC) Lisbon, having been referred to the Generic Competence Court at the beginning of this year (TGC) from Cuba.
Due to space difficulties in the TGC of Cuba, The Inquiry took place last Friday in the main hall of the former Civil Government of Beja, where today the Instructional Debate held by the defenses of 13 defendants who chose this action to avoid trial.
The Instructive Decision will have to be known by tomorrow, 26 March, otherwise the 26 defendants in pre-trial detention and those under house arrest, will have to be released.
Pedro Pestana, lawyer for six defendants, five of which in preventive, once again appeared quite caustic about the way in which the investigating judge of the TCG of Cuba is conducting the process: “I realize that the judge is under pressure for the time she has to make the decision, but I cannot accept that he denied all the evidence presented by the defendants’ defense”, adding that the judge “considered it irrelevant to hear the defense of the witnesses, defense rights were curtailed. The court is preventing defendants from proving their innocence.”, concluded the lawyer.
Just like on Friday, family members and former workers of the defendants, demonstrate at the door of the former Civil Government, holding signs deploring the judge's decision not to hear the defendants' witnesses.
The overwhelming majority of 41 single defendants, men and women, are accused of actually committing a crime of criminal association, fifty-five of human trafficking and one crime of money laundering.
Remember that in the police operation, triggered by 23 November 2022 by the Judicial Police (PJ), were identified “in conditions of human misery” 457 people, having been detained, in at least 14 localities in Baixo Alentejo – Cuba, Beja, Saved, Matthias, Fat Head, Peroguarda, Albernoa, Pedrógão, Faro do Alentejo, Baleizão, Sour village, Vila Alva, Serpa and Beja-, Romanian citizens (20), Portuguese (9), moldavos (7), Indian (3), Guineans (1) and Ukrainians (1), and ‘slave collectors’ in almost all countries of origin of the explorers, three days later, the TCIC decided to place 26 of them in preventive detention.
In the searches, records of transfers of €264 thousand were found, €137 mil, €104 mil, €101 mil, for firms with names created on the spot, like Seductive Spring, Fragrant Dawn, Wealthy Roots, Crystalline Zodiac, Opulent evening, Affable Beaver or Lavender Myriad. According to PJ data contained in the indictment, in five years the organization earned more than €7.7 million, no VAT declarations, IRC or Social Security contributions.
Teixeira Correia
(journalist)
