A federal court in Mexico City has invalidated a 50-year prison sentence against Daniel Arizmendi López, also known as “El Mochaorejas”and four members of his criminal gang for the kidnapping of a tenant of the Central de Abastos in May 1997.
The original sentence was invalidated because the defendants were not given the opportunity to present evidence in their defenseand because due process violations were found in the trial.
The court has ordered that the proceedings be restored and the evidence presented by the accused be accepted.
Daniel Arizmendi Lopezknown as “El Mochaorejas”, is a Mexican criminal who led a criminal gang that engaged in kidnapping and extortion.
Several kidnappings and murders are attributed to him, and he is considered one of the most violent criminals in Mexico.
He was arrested in 2003 and since then has faced various criminal proceedings.. He is currently in prison with several felony convictions hanging over him.
The judge in the case has been instructed to carry out various procedures to gather evidence of torture and, if any, report it to the General Prosecutor of the Republic.
Despite the invalidation of the sentence, the defendants will not be released, since they have sentences of more than 250 years in prison in other processes.
“El Mochaorejas” also faces other kidnapping convictions that have recently been invalidated due to alleged torture used to extract confessions.
This is not the first time that a sentence against “El Mochaorejas” has been invalidated two decades after it was handed down.
In July of last year, the First Collegiate Court also annulled a sentence of 40 years in prison and ordered the proceedings to be restored, given the presumption that they were subjected to torture to confess their participation in five kidnappings registered a quarter of a century ago.
Did not comply with due process
The court ruling that invalidated the sentence of 50 years in prison against Daniel Arizmendi López, alias “El Mochaorejas”, and four members of his criminal gang, was based on the fact that the process did not comply with due process, since the defendants did not They had the opportunity to present evidence in their defense.
The court’s decision was unanimous and ordered an Appeal Collegiate Court to annul the convictions and order the district judge to restore the procedure to accept the evidence and issue a new sentence.
The court also instructed the judge in the case to carry out various procedures to gather evidence of the harassment that the defendants claim to have suffered at the time of self-incrimination. If there is evidence of torture, the judge must report it to the Attorney General’s Office so that an investigation file can be initiated.
The trial of the kidnappers was plagued with violations of due process, mainly the right to defense, since the evidence with which they tried to prove their innocence was not processed. The rapporteur Judge Isabel Porras Odriozola stated that the judge in the case ignored the fact that the defendants did not offer evidence because just at the procedural moment they had to do so, they changed lawyers.
The court also invalidated the sentence because it refers to an incorrect denomination of the crime, the illegal kidnapping provided for in article 366 of the “Penal Code for the DF and for the entire Republic in matters of federal jurisdiction.” The crime for which they were sentenced is common law, corrected the Magistrate.
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