The ten pre-trial detainees, eight men and two women, all foreigners, are subject to an identity and residence agreement (TIR), daily presentations to the authorities of their place of residence and prohibition of contacts with other defendants and victims.
Two Portuguese, who live in Beja and were under house arrest, also saw the measure changed, becoming only subject to IRR. They left the court on their own and very relieved, after 15 months of confinement, first in the prison and then in their homes.
The case took place at the Central Criminal Investigation Court (TCIC) in Lisbon and, at the beginning of this year, it was transmitted to a criminal investigation judge in Cuba. It has 51 defendants – 41 people and ten companies -, 14 of which requested the opening of the investigation. Ten of those released this Monday were part of the group that took part in this procedural phase.
“This is a professional victory, especially since the judge did not allow the witnesses I requested to be heard. If that had happened, I would have released my fifth client”, reacted lawyer Pedro Pestana, who defends four of the released defendants.
The lawyer added that, “for some of the defendants, the crimes of criminal association and money laundering have already fallen”.
Other defendants may be released
Tomorrow, Tuesday, the instructional debate continues. If the decision is not known this Tuesday, the remaining defendants will have to be released, as the period of preventive detention, which has lasted for one year and four months, has run out”, he concluded.
This Monday’s session was also marked by the protest of lawyers who threatened to abandon the session due to the lack of working conditions, as due to the lack of adequate seats, with a chair and desk, in the main room of the Beja Court, twelve of the twenty defenders of the defendants participating in the investigative debate were seated in the “dock” to be able to defend their clients.
In turn, the defendants sat on benches intended for the public in open court trials.
The additional interrogation took place last Friday, in the Noble Hall of the former Civil Government of Beja, which, late this Monday afternoon, was busy with a session of the Municipal Assembly of Beja (AMB). It was for this reason that the pre-trial session was transferred to the court building. This Tuesday, the case returns to the former Civil Government.
The defendants are suspected of being part of a criminal structure that gathered labor in Eastern European countries and exploited them in agricultural work.
