THE Zaragoza Provincial Court considered that there is a risk that the director of the Ateca juvenile center could escape if he leaves prison. Thus, the magistrates of the third chamber rejected the appeal of the director of the Ateca center and the NGO who requested his release, so that he continues in Zuera prison, with the four other workers.
The director of the Ateca juvenile center, Ivan Rodriguezhad filed an appeal to request freedom from the investigating judge, Aida Ramirezwill send him to temporary prison without bail on August 2 for evidence of possible crimes against moral integrity, torture, injuries and membership in a criminal group.
However, the magistrates of the third section of the Provincial Court rejected the appeal and Iván Rodríguez will remain in prison. In doing so, the Court once again maintains the judge’s decision, given that this Monday the magistrates also rejected the appeal of another of the imprisoned workers, considering that there is sufficient evidence to have made this decision, given that the punitive pressure they face is sufficiently serious (approximately 14 years minimum prison).
The NGO supports the director
However, what is striking about the appeal presented by the director of the Ateca penitentiary center is that both the Health and Community Foundation and the Lagunduz Integral Assistance Association support him throughout this process, adhering to the appeal presented by the lawyer who takes the case, to try to get him out of prison. Well, we must take into account that Iván Rodríguez was the person who was in charge of managing the juvenile center for a year, when he took over. Daniel Urbina.
The scandal surrounding this foundation is very serious, given that several minor detainees declared before the judge that they had suffered mistreatment and humiliation in the Ateca center, and that they had been forced to practice sex games between minors and interned men.
Furthermore, at least one sexual assault on a minor under 16 has been reported so far, by two menas in which one of the workers is said to be present as an accomplice. A fact of which the former supervisor of the center, Miguel Ángel VP, also accused of being a “necessary collaborator”, would also be aware.
However, during all this time, none of these companies that managed the so-called therapeutic center for minors with behavioral problems (and which continue to manage dozens of social centers throughout Spain), have made a single public statement about this. And the Government of Aragon has broken all the contracts it had with the Health and Community Foundation to which it had paid 1.2 million euros per year for the services agreed with the Aragonese Institute of Social Services.
The director of the Ateca center in prison
One of the reasons given by the director’s defense for requesting immediate release was that “it was not clearly understood” what the director’s representative had said. Ministry of Finance at the hearing, which they requested to be canceled.
However, in the dismissal order to which OKDIARIO had access, the magistrates consider that even if “what the representative of the Prosecutor’s Office says is not well understood”, “the people present at the event have understood well understood since no observation was made to respect at that time. They claim that the lawyer now signing the appeal “is the same as during this appearance” and that “he has said nothing about the quality of the recording or the extent to which his right to defense could be affected for this reason.
More testimonies from minors
Likewise, the magistrates did not take into account the allegation of the director’s lawyer according to which, at the time of ordering pre-trial detention, “there were only the statements of two minors”. In this regard, the Zaragoza court warns that “they will accumulate complaints filed by minors admitted to the center for events in which the people surveyed will be more or less involved.
Furthermore, the magistrates believe that the judge took into account the testimony of a minor, highlighting “the delay in taking her to the doctor”, concluding that the director “had seriously failed in his obligations”. its role as guarantor and that he had, in this way, intervened in the commission of crimes which he describes as offenses against moral integrity, torture, injuries during attacks, sexual assaults on minors under 16 years of age and of belonging to a criminal group.
The director could escape
Concerning the risk of flight, the lawyer, in the appeal he presented, complained that the objective of avoiding the risk of flight by sending him to prison is not such. However, the magistrates, as in the case of the other Moroccan worker who appealed against pre-trial detention, see “risk of escape“, given that “it must be taken into account that the facts alleged and indicated above are serious and entail sanctions adapted to their seriousness, which is particularly important to assess this risk”, they explain in the prescription.
“It is a considerable sanction”, they add, referring to the minimum “fourteen years» those he faces for the crimes with which he is accused. They also believe that there is “a possibility of infringing on the legal rights of victims.”
“We must keep in mind that these are minors, who have a double vulnerability due to the fact that they are minors, whose personal circumstances have led them to reside in a center with particular characteristics like the one in question. To this it must be added that the victims are still in a phase of determination and that they are people perfectly known and identifiable by the appellant”, they conclude.
