Global Courant 2023-05-09 02:49:48
Marcos Bazán, one of the two accused of the femicide of Anahí Benítez, demanded “justice” for the murdered 16-year-old teenager, demanded “Not one less” and asked that “innocent people not be imprisoned.” He was using his “last words” before the verdict in the second trial for the femicide and rape of the young woman in the Santa Catalina reserve, in Lomas de Zamora. The ruling will be announced on May 16.
Anahí’s mother, Silvia Pérez Vilor, also asked to use the last words and the Oral Criminal Court (TOC) No. 7 granted it. The woman said she felt “nothing represented by the State” in this debate and asked for life imprisonment for both Bazán (39) -for whom the prosecution has already requested acquittal-, and for the other defendant, Marcelo Villalba (46). .
Before judges Daniel Mazzini, Santiago Márquez and Gustavo Ramilo, Bazán stood up to speak, but they asked him to sit down, along with his lawyers. “First of all, I’m sorry for what happened to Anahí, I’m sorry for what happened to the family, they lost their daughter. I’m really sorry for what happened to her,” he said.
Then he ruled out that his house had been the scene of the crime and disassociated himself from the victim and the other defendant, stating: “Anahí was not in my house, I do not know Villalba, I do not know her companions.”
Anahí Benítez was raped, murdered and her body found in an ecological reserve in Lomas de Zamora.
“The only thing we all ask for is justice and that whatever has to be investigated be investigated, whoever falls. Not only ‘not one less’, but also that there are no innocent people imprisoned for crimes they are accused of and did not commit.”
In his turn, Villalba rejected the possibility of saying anything in relation to the case and only asked the judges to return to his place of detention.
When they asked him if he wanted to say something, he replied: “No, nothing. I wanted to ask you if you can reinstate me to Unit 34,” referring to the specialized prison for psychiatric patients located in Melchor Romero.
The judges were about to close the hearing when the lawyer Guillermo Bernard Krizan, who represents Anahí’s mother as a victim, asked TOC 7 to also allow Pérez Vilor to say a few last words to them, something that is formally intended only for the defendants.
After deliberating, the judges accepted it and Anahí’s mother criticized everyone and asked for the maximum sentence for the two defendants.
“What I want to say is that from the heart I felt very little represented, or not at all represented by the State in this trial,” he said in a clear allusion to the position assumed by the prosecutor Marisa Monti, who in her plea only asked for life imprisonment for Villalba -the accused committed by a DNA study-, but who demanded the acquittal of Bazán.
“All the evidence is in the cause. What I ask of the judges is that they do not value the interpretation of the evidence, but rather go to the report and read it and see that so many things together in one house cannot possibly indicate that a person was not there,” he pointed out about the alleged indications that, according to his position, incriminate Bazán.
“I wanted to add lastly that I do not agree with the acquittal that the prosecutor said or even with the secondary participation that my defense attorney said,” he said, even questioning what was raised by his lawyer in the plea.
“I agree with the previous TOC 7 and I ask for life sentences for Mr. Bazán and for Mr. Villalba. Nothing more, thank you very much,” Pérez concluded.
Judges Mazzini, Márquez and Ramilo announced that they will announce the verdict and the eventual sentence, on May 16, at 12.
In the first trial held in 2020, Bazán had been sentenced to life imprisonment considered the author of the Anahí crime, while Villalba was not tried because the judges understood that he presented a “psychotic” picture and that he was not in a condition to be in the debate. .
However, in December 2021 the Buenos Aires Criminal Court of Cassation annulled the sentence and ordered a new oral trial, which began on March 1 before the same TOC 7 of Lomas de Zamora, although made up of other judges.
In her plea of April 14, prosecutor Monti only asked for life imprisonment for Villalba (46), whom she considered guilty of the crimes of “aggravated illegal deprivation of liberty”, “theft”, “triple aggravated homicide for treachery, criminis causa and for mediating gender violence” (femicide)”, and “aggravated sexual abuse due to carnal access”, to the detriment of Anahí Benítez (16).
But the representative of the Public Ministry ruled out that Bazán had participated in the act and linked his incrimination with the participation of the dog trainer Diego Tula, whose expert opinion -concluded that Anahí had been in the defendant’s house and that he was in the place where the The teenager’s body was found buried-, was questioned for the lack of “scientific rigor”.
The lawyer Bernard Krizan, representative of the victim’s mother, agreed with the prosecutor in requesting life imprisonment for Villalba, but with respect to Bazán, he requested 14 years in prison, considering him a “secondary participant” in the crimes foisted on the other defendant and, alternatively, it required 5 years and 6 months for their “aggravated concealment”.
Lawyers Manuel Garrido -who is the head of the Innocence Project human rights organization- and Camila Calvo asked that Bazán be considered innocent in the second trial for the case.
Roberto Fernández, Villalba’s official defender, the other defendant for the crime whose DNA matched that found on the victim’s body and was arrested at the time after he handed over Anahí’s Samsung cell phone to his son, requested that, in If he is found to be a co-perpetrator of the homicide, the sentence does not exceed 15 years in prison for considering that he has a “diminished inimputability” due to suffering from “schizophrenia, a degenerative disease.”
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