Angel Santiesteban, Translator: Unstated
Photo of a fragment of a document from the file of Ángel
Santiesteban-Prats where you can read at the end in a handwritten note:
"Case of interest to the Minister." Refers to General Colome Ibarra.
Cuba's totalitarian regime treats Defense Attorneys as unwelcome to
those who have no choice but to endure them for sake of pretending, in
the face of international public opinion, that they really have a
judicial system capable of protecting the basic rights of the Accused
before trial.
In the course of the investigation, the Accused is never allowed the
presence of his Representative, and receives the file when it is already
accomplished fact, nor is he allowed to demand any legal presence or
advice during this important time of intense interrogations and abuse by
the police investigators.
On August 5th my former Attorney submitted a complaint to the Director
of the Collective Law Offices of Carlos III where she cited, with a copy
to the Minister of Justice, the police pressure against her, and the
complete lack of ethics and the audacity as they tried to involve her in
the charges against me.
Finally, I had to accept a change in my Legal Representative, and sign a
new contract for my defense.
The Attorney's next step is to locate the file and enter his legal
paperwork to be acknowledged as Attorney for the Defense. As required by
his work, my representative presented himself on several occasions at
the Picota police station, and after a great deal of evasion, someone
let slip the secret that the file, as so often since I was at the
Provincial Court, could be found at Villa Marista, headquarters of Cuban
State Security.
My Attorney started to call this headquarters and, of course, they knew
nothing of this file, so he had to return to the Picota station and
continue pressing them to locate the file. After talking to the chief of
investigations, he was assured that this person had delivered it,
personally, to an official named Oscar, at the Department of Special
Cases at Villa Marista.
In several calls that the Attorney repeatedly made to Villa Marista,
they told him there was no official there named Oscar, finally allowing
him to investigate the file in person. And after several hours at Villa
Marista, they informed him that the case was already submitted to the
Provincial Prosecutor, where he immediately presented himself. After two
days of insisting, they called him to make an appointment and finally
agreed to enter his paperwork for representation and to allow him to
study the file.
I will not report all the violations committed in this case, because
every time I make public a transgression of the law, they invent a
justification and resort to any artifice, thus worsening the crude
process and my condition as the Accused.
On the charge of Attempted Murder, they still haven't managed to create
every detail and have had to lower it to a charge of Injury. I am not an
Attorney and I can't understand the legal codes, but it's easy to intuit
their sleight of hand to associate me with some immoral crime.
To prove that these accusations have no other purpose than a gross
manipulation by the State in order to pressure me and to convince me
that I should remain silent in my blog, I have the three "witnesses" of
the Prosecutor: two are my ex-partner who exhibits various unforgivable
errors to her credibility, and a friend who contradicts herself within
the same statement; and the other. supposed to be the most important,
agrees to record a video detailing the gifts my ex has given him and the
pressures of the investigators to make a declaration against me, which
debunks the arguments of the plaintiff and destroys the evidence of the
Prosecutor who should, out of self-respect, drop the charges.
But, on the contrary, they prefer to keep pushing and making themselves
ridiculous despite everything, so they sent the file back to criminal
investigation and there they came up with the idea of another accusation
to try to discredit the video of the witness, and that forced them to
lodge against me a new charge of "Assault." Of course, again I am a
ghost they can make and break without anyone seeing me. At times I feel
like they have confused me with Batman.
The experts have ruled that: "In the video there is no evidence of any
threatening pressure on the 'witness,' who speaks with total freedom, he
was found in his house, he made the film on different days, and he
delayed months in denouncing the supposed threat," and in addition,
Captain Amauri Guerra Toyo is advised to delve into the characteristics
of the witness.
Moreover, in an attempt to undermine my credibility, the remember I
posted to my blog when they sent me to the Havana Psychiatric Hospital
(Mazorra), and that when I told the doctors my name they asked me if I
was the writer, and began to talk to me about literature and comment on
my books. Then I took off without knowing their professional
determination about me, and now there is a certificate in the file where
they certify that I do not have any mental disorder.
So now the Prosecutor will issue a new petition to be added to those 15
years deprivation of liberty that were hanging over me before.
In this new revision of the file, which my previous lawyer had already
shown me and of which I was able to take photos, the statements do not
match, they have been altered to sharpen the opinion of the Investigator
Amauri Guerra Toyo, whose role as an agent of the prosecutor and whose
lack of impartiality is evident at all times. With crude maneuvering, at
the end of the statements, you can easily see that there is a period,
and next to it is added a comma and words that I never signed to, which
occurred in front of my former lawyer.
The malfeasance of Captain Amauri Guerra Toyo in his work as an
investigator has been based on a looking for some possibility to connect
me to the events they charged me with, which, after almost two years,
has failed. In addition, the truth cannot be covered over with lies,
adding to his ineptitude as an investigator, his lack of rigor and
training in policing, ethics, humanity and culture. On several occasions
he called me "synical" and made various spelling errors such as: "kame"
for "came," "sertainly," and "bicit" for "visit," just to mention some
of the most aberrant.
When my Attorney decided to publicly release the proofs of fraud and
falsification in the file itself, he delivered compelling evidence that
once more disproved the accusations.
On occasion, my Attorney could not help but smile without hiding the
pain caused by so much injustice. He assures me that just one of the
charges against me is sufficient to be in preventive custody, but the
Prosecutor, knowing he possesses no proof against me, has preferred to
let me remain out on bail.
The Attorney is certain that at the trial my innocence will be obvious.
But we must be aware of where we are living, the rigged processes of
these 53 years which the Castro brothers' government has accustomed us
to. What a horror we have lived through! We know that to punish the
voices and the acts that put their power in danger, they have armed the
worst circuses. Just to name a few, I remember when they executed by
firing squad a "Hero of the Cuban Republic," as General Ochoa was. They
have shot their ministers, others have died in prison in mysterious
circumstances, people such as General Jose Abrantes, Minister of the
Interior, killed only to benefit the Government by sealing a cave full
of dates, details and facts about the Cuban leaders and their families.
And just to site one of the latest and most scandalous sentences, that
of the Spanish journalist Sebastian Martinez Ferrate, for making a
documentary on child prostitution in Cuba.
So, then, what confidence can I have in a process rigged by this
Government ruling over the island? What guarantees do I have when facing
a Court that openly responds to the orders and designs of the State?
Answering these questions fills me with uncertainty. I cannot guess
though I can intuit the probable. I just have to accept and face my fate
with dignity. Of course, I can respond by the acts of which I declare
myself totally conscious:
I declare myself guilty of being the author of this blog, The Children
Nobody Wanted, and for this I will answer before God and my time.
Ángel Santiesteban-Prats
October 2 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment