“It was a group action”: the chief investigator of the ‘Samuel case’ dismantles the exculpatory version of his alleged murderers

The six tragic minutes that lasted the lynching of Samuel Luiz They are a devilish puzzle made up of thousands of small pieces that make sense of each other. It was not a single person who took his life, but several, and they did not do it with a sudden blow but in a bloody hunt of almost 200 meters, in front of dozens of witnesses whose versions do not always coincideand static cameras and mobile phones whose images do not allow those who appear in them to be identified at first glance and with absolute clarity.

To prove that They killed Samuel in droves the five alleged murderers who have been sitting on the bench of the Provincial Court of A Coruña for two weeks, all the parts of that puzzle must fit together seamlessly. In time and space, at each specific moment and in each precise place. Of that millimeter assembly between documentary and testimonial evidence It depends on what the jury can make about them. a verdict of innocence or guilt.

Until this Wednesday, defense lawyers They had done their best to prevent the pieces that the witnesses were leaving on the stand from revealing the incriminating story about its clients that the Prosecutor’s Office has built. And they surely managed sow some reasonable doubts in the jury about it, either because the witnesses did not accurately remember fundamental details of the events, or because they were made to incur contradictions during their interrogations or simply because what they revealed exonerated their clients.

Six tragic minutes

In view of this day, however, the police commander who led the investigation During the first months after the events, he offered a complete, reasonable and forceful version of how the five accused acted before, during and after those six tragic minutes, and why the evidence and testimonies collected during the investigation of the case led to their arrest. and its subsequent processing. “It was a group action in which some attacked and others prevented Samuel from being helped. It was brutal, atrocious, inhuman and disproportionate,” he summarized.

The police officer explained simply and convincingly why investigators identified Diego Mountain as the first one who began savagely attacking Samuel with his fists amidst homophobic insults, and why they were sure that those who supported him came first Alejandro Freire, Yumbawho tried to strangle him from behind, and immediately Kaio Amaralwho ran in their direction to join them in kicking the boy, from whom he had stolen the phone.

All in the presence of Catherine Silvawho would have contributed to increasing Samuel’s defenselessness by pushing away the friend who was trying to help him, and who, far from trying to calm the aggressors, as his defense maintains, would have paved the way for them keeping two of them warm clothes while they beat the victim.

The investigator’s testimony also points to Alejandro Miguezwho, contrary to what he maintains, would have been at the very core of the aggression, following her on the front line throughout the entire route until Samuel collapsed. The police officer also recalled that Míguez had admitted to another witness that he had confronted Magatte N’Diaye, one of the two Senegalese who tried to help himthus allowing the rest to circumvent that protection to continue hitting the deceased.

Almost four hours of testimony

The police officer remained firm during the nearly four hours that his statement lasted. He spoke looking at the jurydetailing how each piece of the puzzle fits together with the rest, explaining how each of his statements was supported by the testimony of one or more of the accused and witnesses, and how and Why did those descriptions fit? in the map of the place where Sameul was killed, with the frames from up to several different cameras and with the minutes of the videos. And he used logic when defense attorneys tried to find loopholes of inconsistency in the evidentiary fragments that he assembled:

– How do you know that the accused was there, and not where he says, if there were no cameras recording him in that place?
– Because the previous camera does record you going to that place, and on the other hand it does not record your return.

Much of the puzzle that hides what happened that morning is made up of versions of what happened after the lynching. And the police witness was also forceful when setting them up: the five young people left the place separately, alone or as a couple, but They met again that night twice in separate city parks, where they would have learned that Samuel had died. Then, calls and WhatsApp messages were exchanged, individually and in the joint chat that one of them managed.