A Madrid court has decided to acquit a graffiti artist who had been sentenced to prison for vandalizing a train with an 18 square meter graffiti in the town of Alcalá de Henares. The judges annulled a sentence of two years and one day in prison, in addition to the obligation to pay Renfe the 3,476.33 euros it cost to repair the car, because the Police limited themselves to identifying his signature, which they already knew from other times, instead of looking for evidence that placed him on the platform at the time of the graffiti. That alone, says the Provincial Court, is not enough to convict the graffiti artist.
The man now acquitted, according to the sentence that elDiario.es has been able to examine, sat in the dock after the Police accused him of being directly responsible for graffiti that covered a large part of a commuter train in the Madrid town of Alcalá de Henares. A graffiti of 18 square meters. It is unknown if the cameras had captured the accused painting the carriage, but the agents pointed him out without a doubt in court: it was his signature, the same tag that he displayed on social networks.
That was enough for a magistrate to impose a sentence of two years and one day in prison for a crime of “damage to property intended for public use,” in addition to the obligation to compensate Renfe. A sentence aggravated by the existence of a valid criminal record: a court in Paterna had already imposed, a year earlier, another sentence of 16 months in prison for a crime of damage, a sentence that was not carried out.
The Provincial Court of Madrid has examined the case and has concluded that the accused was convicted without sufficient evidence, rejecting among other arguments his unproven allegation that at that time he was incarcerated in the Barcelona prison of Brians. The judges recognize that there is “indiciary evidence” against him, such as the fact that the Police identified that the signature that appeared on the train was the one he usually used, but that is not enough to impose a sentence that implies his mandatory entry into prison.
The police officers, throughout the trial, explained that the accused had already been arrested several times “carrying spray cans” and that the signature of a graffiti artist “implies publicity for its author, even greater if it is done in a train car.” , for its mobility.” They indicated that they verified “on the social networks” that this was his signature but, the court now reproaches, “the social network is not identified and nor are any images of the aforementioned networks in which the appellant is observed with the signature attributed to him.”
Judges recognize that a graffiti artist’s signature is often used personally. “In that world of graffiti, its authors sign their works and none of them use the tag of the rest,” grants the Madrid Court. But there is no evidence that locates him that day near the vandalized train in Alcalá de Henares and it is also “irrelevant” that he had been detained more times with boats, “which is not criminal.” “This appeals body has doubts about the authorship of the graffiti,” they say to annul that sentence of two years and one day in prison.
The police officers who appeared at the trial, explains the Madrid Court, “do not prove that the appellant was at the scene of the events on the day and time indicated, creating graffiti, which is identified only by his signature, a claim denied by the accused.” . The original sentence, now completely annulled, included paying Renfe what it cost to clean the graffiti and replacing the prison sentence for his expulsion from the country as a Belarusian citizen in an irregular situation.
The Spanish courts have established in recent years that, if there is sufficient evidence, a graffiti artist can face a prison sentence, especially if the object of his graffiti has been some type of artistic heritage. Three years ago the Supreme Court established in this type of cases that judges could convict for a crime against the historical-artistic heritage. The judges analyzed the case of a man who in 2017 was hunted after making several graffiti on a sculpture by Eduardo Chillida in the Plaza del Rey in Madrid and decided to impose five months in prison in addition to the obligation to compensate the capital’s City Council with the more than 1,300 euros that its repair cost.
The Madrid city council, as Somos Madrid explained, approved at the end of last year a tightening of the environmental provision protocol to substitute sanctions regarding the cleaning of public spaces and waste management so that the authors of these graffiti cannot substitute fines for a community service unless they agree to remove the graffiti themselves.
In the last year, according to data from the City Council, 264 files and 384 complaints have been filed, there are 42 investigated and almost 700 identified, 200 surveillance units have been deployed and 117 reports have been sent to investigating courts and another nine to the Public Prosecutor’s Office. Environment for crimes of damage to protected buildings or buildings of cultural interest.
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