Buenos Aires Supreme Court confirms life sentence for double murder of deputy Olivares and adviser Yadón
The Buenos Aires Superior Court of Justice rejected the defence complaint from Juan Jesús Fernández, convicted as a necessary participant in the double homicide that occurred in 2019.
Supreme Court upholds life sentence for driver of car in double murder at Congress Plaza
The Superior Court of Justice (TSJ) of the City of Buenos Aires confirmed on Thursday the life sentence for Juan Jesús Fernández for the murders of national deputy Héctor Olivares and his adviser Miguel Yadón, according to revistaquorum.com.ar. The court rejected the complaint filed by the defence, which argued that Fernández was unaware of the intentions of the man who fired shots from the vehicle he was driving.
The events date back to the early morning of 9 May 2019, when Olivares and Yadón were taking their usual walk around the Plaza de los Dos Congresos. From inside a vehicle, both were attacked by gunfire. Yadón died at the scene; Olivares died days later from the wounds he received.
During the oral trial, Criminal and Correctional Court No. 9 found it proven that the shots came from a vehicle belonging to Fernández, who was at the wheel. The judges determined that he had facilitated the actions of Juan José Navarro Cádiz, identified as the perpetrator of the homicides and who died in 2023. On that basis, Fernández received a life sentence as a necessary participant in the double murder, a decision later confirmed by the National Chamber of Cassation.
The Supreme Court's ruling rendered ineffective the appeal filed by Fernández against the ruling of Section III of the National Chamber of Cassation in Criminal and Correctional Matters, which had upheld his responsibility as a necessary participant in aggravated homicide by treachery, repeated on two occasions.
The defence centred its arguments on challenging Fernández's participation, the application of the aggravating circumstance of treachery, and the constitutionality of the life sentence. It also denounced an alleged violation of guarantees of innocence and due process. However, the Supreme Court concluded that the submission failed to refute the grounds of Cassation or demonstrate that the judicial responses to its challenges had been insufficient or unreasonable.
Following confirmation of the sentence by Cassation, Fernández's lawyers filed a constitutional challenge appeal in which they insisted that their client was unaware of Navarro Cádiz's intentions and questioned both the assessment of his involvement in the homicides and the constitutional validity of the sentence. On bringing the complaint before the Supreme Court after Cassation denied that appeal, the deputy attorney general ruled that the submission should be rejected for insurmountable formal deficiencies and for failing to meet the requirement of technical self-sufficiency.
In its ruling, the Supreme Court held that the defence did not address the arguments developed by Cassation and did not demonstrate that the responses provided to its claims were insufficient or unreasonable, thus closing the available appeal route for Fernández in Buenos Aires jurisdiction.
Source: Google News AR — Buenos Aires