The Prosecutor's Office maintains its 20-year petition for Rodrigo de Santos and concludes that he used his power to rape
The Prosecutor's Office maintains its request for twenty years in prison for Rodrigo de Santos for a continuous crime of sexual abuse against a man and five for a sexual assault against another, both users of an NGO where the former PP politician was hired and promoted to responsible for shelter houses for prisoners on leave. In the last session of the trial, the Public Ministry has also upheld the accusation of a subsidiary civil liable for Horizontes Abierta-Padre Garralda, the NGO close to the PP that hired and made the former deputy mayor of Palma responsible for the shelters. convicted in the past for sexually abusing two minors, friends of his children.
Rodrigo de Santos recognizes "insinuations" to one of his alleged victims but denies the violations
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The prosecutor has exposed in her conclusions the "prevalimento" that occurs in the facts, that is, the power that the defendant exercised over the victim and which he would have used to commit the violations. De Santos would have threatened his victims with withdrawing the institution's endorsement and compromising their prison permits by informing Penitentiary Institutions against it. "Rodrigo's power in the institution has been more than proven even after he left," the prosecutor said, relying on the testimony of several former workers who during the hearing denounced the "humiliating" treatment that Rodrigo de Santos began to give to colleagues. and users from the moment he stopped being a volunteer and was hired, later promoted, by the NGO, with a board full of PP politicians.
The representative of the Public Ministry considers credible the testimony of the main victim, who would have been forced by the accused to allow himself to be fellatio so that he could later penetrate him seven times, always at the NGO's premises. Six of those alleged sexual assaults were in De Santos 'office, on a floor other than the inmates' rooms, and one in the bathroom of another of the foster homes, according to the indictment. "If it were a constructed or invented story, why would I add a different scenario", the prosecutor has exposed.
"A modus operandi nailed" to the rapes of children for which he was convicted
The Prosecutor's Office has revealed that the defendant has claimed during the hearing to be "sexually active" when the Provincial Court of Palma condemned him for having managed to get a 13-year-old boy to penetrate him after performing fellatio. The private prosecution has referred to these proven facts by assuring that in the case under trial, Rodrigo de Santos would have followed "a nailed modus operandi."
The victim's representation, exercised by the Red Jurídica law firm, has denounced alleged falsehoods in several episodes of Rodrigo de Santos' testimony, such as when he tried to defend that his shift coincided involuntarily with the nights that the victim spent in the foster home, while that NGO workers have denied that De Santos offered the shifts and have assured that he expressly reserved them. The prosecution of this victim requests 94 years in prison for De Santos for the seven rapes. The representation of the other young man, alleged victim of the abuse, asks for the same penalty as the Prosecutor's Office.
Rodrigo de Santos has denied the sexual assaults during the trial and has limited himself to recognizing the "insinuations" to one of the victims that, on the other hand, are credited by WhatsApp messages in the summary. His defense has focused on highlighting the differences and alleged contradictions between the various statements of the victims, especially that of the seven alleged violations, and that the questionable, in his opinion, testimony is the only evidence against his client. The defendant has made use of his right to the last word and has said: "My impression is that I am sitting here for only one reason: my political and criminal record."
According to the defense, who exercises the office of former Anticorruption Prosecutor Pedro Horrach, it is a fabricated testimony to which the second victim joined for spurious interests. The main victim wanted revenge for the negative report that Rodrigo de Santos had presented against him to Penitentiary Institutions on the same day that the former politician reported against the endorsement by the NGO.
In this last and third day of the trial, two teams of experts have appeared, those of the prosecution to defend their expert, and those of the defense to expose their counter-expert. The prosecution's experts have argued that if the testimony of the main victim differs in some points in some statements and in others it only confirms their credibility: if it had been invented it would always have been the same, they have defended.
The defense experts have defended that the defendant, who only served five years in prison for the abuse of minors, shows "a high level of empathy" and is a person "with morals." Thus they have linked the abuse of minors to cocaine addiction that they consider that the accused had already overcome when the events for which he is accused occurred.
The NGO representation has defended that it took measures as soon as it learned of the arrest of Rodrigo de Santos, although it had not reacted to the victims' complaint, and added that the case has led to a remodeling of the protocols to update them, unlinking the current heads of the foundation that governs the NGO of the events that occurred when De Santos was responsible for the shelters.
