14ymedio, Madrid, January 29, 2024 — Almost nine months after the anti-government protests in Caimanera, repressed by the black berets and during which there were deliberate cuts to the internet service, the Guantánamo Prosecutor’s Office has made public its ruling with the sanctions it requests for six of the detainees, of between four and nine years in prison.
On Saturday, the activist Marcel Valdés released the document, provided by the parents of some detainees, which includes the request for nine years in prison for the crimes of “public disorder” and “instigation to commit crimes” for Daniel Álvarez González, who has the highest penalty.
He is followed by Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez, Rodolfo Álvarez González and Freddy Sarquiz González, whom the Prosecutor’s Office accuses of several crimes of public disorder, and asks for six years of deprivation of liberty.
He is followed by Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez, Rodolfo Álvarez González and Freddy Sarquiz González, whom the Prosecutor’s Office accuses of several crimes of public disorder for which they ask for six years of deprivation of liberty
The judge has requested the same years, but also for a crime of attack, for Felipe Octavio Correa Martínez, while the request for a penalty for Yandri Pelier Matos, accused of public disorder and resistance, is four years in prison.
The document indicates that on 6 May 2023 Daniel Álvarez González and Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez began to shout slogans such as “Abajo Díaz-Canel“, “Abajo la Revolución“, with signs of having consumed “alcoholic beverages” and in order to “promote chaos.” Their calls incited other neighbors to accompany them, according to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which affirms that they came to try to impose themselves on law enforcement to avoid arrests.
The Prosecutor’s Office accuses several of the protesters of having “unadjusted behavior” and not participating in “activities guided by political and mass organizations.” In his opinion, the defendants maintain “reprehensible” behaviors, including games such as la bolita (a lottery) and dog fights, in addition to being unemployed. However, none of them have a criminal record.
Victoria Martínez Valdivia, mother of two of the accused, told Martí Noticias that the only one who had received the file was Yandri Pelier, while at home they were still waiting for the document. Her son Luis Miguel is in prison awaiting trial, while Felipe Octavio was released on bail.
“I expected it for Luis Miguel, because he did protest himself peacefully. Yes, he did, and he says he won’t regret it. He affirms that he simply asked for freedom and food for his family and his people. But Felipe Octavio Correa Martínez, what they have said about him is a lie, because the boy was not even at the demonstration. Felipe’s participation was when the abusers, those criminals, left him upstairs to kill his brother, and he hugged his brother. Felipe says: ’Mom, I don’t regret it, because I will guard my little brother so that they wouldn’t give him more blows,’” he said this Sunday in the middle of Miami.
Correa Martínez was released from pre-trial detention with Pelier Matos in June, after spending a month in detention. Two months later, in August, they also left jail after paying bail Rodolfo Álvarez González and Freddy Sarquiz González.
Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez and Daniel Álvarez González, accused of instigating the protest, have since been in the Combinado de Guantánamo prison, where they have had to suffer the diseases derived from the poor living conditions that occur in the prisons of the Island.
“I expected it for Luis Miguel, because he did protest himself peacefully. Yes, he did, and he says he won’t regret it. He affirms that he simply asked for freedom and food for his family and his people”
The protests in Caimanera, the emblematic municipality known for its proximity to the US naval base of Guantánamo, took place on the night of Saturday, May 6 of last year and were the most important after those of 11 July 2021, known as ’11J’, and those sparked by the power outages that splashed in the summer of 2022. Around a hundred people participated in them and they were repressed with blows and arrests.
The official press quickly launched a campaign to label the protest as counter-revolutionary and point it out as an action of the “hybrid war” against the Government. Cubadebate released an extensive article entitled Caymanera: What it was and what they tried to be in which it described what happened as an “unusual demonstration” of a few dozen people “initiated by an incident with a small group in a state of drunkenness” and taken advantage of in Miami to “try to give the image of a rebellious country and encourage the uncautious who believed it.”
Organizations such as Amnesty International have reacted against the arrests in Caimanera by telling the Government that the response to a protest could never be state violence.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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