Written by: Yadaimí Domínguez
On August 10, the hearing was held before the Supreme Court to review the Appeal brought by our family and promoted by the First Vice Minister of Justice.
When the doors of the courtroom opened, we family and friends who had been waiting an hour for this tense moment began to enter; the prosecutor was waiting standing on the left side. He wanted to hide his face due to nerves, but it was very difficult to hide.
The lawyer standing on the right side of the room took her seat. Although slightly nervous before a public that awaited her best presentation, but she felt very safe and confident, knowing she has the TRUTH, that just one more time needed to be exposed in order the achieve, everything that was depending on her: long-delayed justice.
The judges entered, took their respective seats, and started the Hearing. The prosecutor was exceedingly lax in his presentation. Among the atrocities he mentioned was that, “if Yamil intended to travel to Cancun, he had to prove that objective.” He also questioned the opinion of the Minister of Justice, in supporting the Appeal of a Case which apparently had no new elements.
I don’t have enough time to delve into each one of the barbarities uttered by this phenomenon but I will comment briefly on the two I just mentioned. About the first, it’s obvious that if Yamil was going to Cancun, he didn’t owe anyone a reason. Anyone who doubts this, would have to prove otherwise. Innocence is presumed under the law and the prosecutor has to demonstrate guilt through OBJECTIVE elements, and before an impartial court, with all the guarantees for the defense. Of course, the attorney, in her conclusions, made this very clear.
With respect to the second idiocy of the prosecutor that I mention in this post, it is clear that he pretended not to fully know Article 456 of Law 5 of the Criminal Procedure Act, or underestimated the level of knowledge of the laws on the part of the audience, or what is even worse, lacked the professional ethics and respect for the opinion of the First Vice-minister of Justice. Gentlemen, it is precisely the Causal 10 of Article 456 of Law 5, which constituted one of the precepts that led to the Review, saying that the Court had all the evidence that indicated the innocence of the accused and inexplicably, did not reflect it in his sentence, and in consequence the sentence was unjust. What new elements is the prosecutor talking about, if it is already in the causal record it doesn’t necessarily have to be new elements, because those there from the beginning were clearly visible and those the court ruled on, were they omitted in their opinion?
The defense again made a brilliant argument. She explained the technical issues of the operation of the GPA and dared to say, very respectfully, that there was tampering with regards to the expert witness who appeared at the trial on March 19, 2008. She also explained about the two weather reports, claiming that No. 31, produced by the instructor, corresponded to the Department of Forecasts; while Report No. 42 was issued by the Department of State of the Sea of the Meteorological Institute of Cuba. She made it clear that Yamil is innocent because even if he had entered the country illegally, the state of necessity of arriving at an international port, under circumstances that put his life in danger (bad weather) and which he couldn’t avoid, exonerated him from any criminal responsibility, according to Articles 22.1 and 215.2 of Law 62 (Penal Code).
Hopefully soon the Notorious Injustice of my brother’s case will be buried with the just opinion that will be issued by the 5 judges of the Criminal Division of the Supreme Court, who participated in this review and who have the privilege of amending a judicial error, which should not have happened, much less been prolonged.
August 11, 2010
