Defence lawyer attacked with pencil at Santiago Justice Centre breaks silence
Nicole Sánchez, public defender, was the victim of an attempted murder by her own client on 8 September in Santiago.
Defender recounts attack with pencil during judicial hearing
Nicole Sánchez, public defender, spoke for the first time about the attempted murder she suffered on 8 September inside the Santiago Justice Centre. According to t13.cl, the attacker was her own client, Sebastián Garrido Caniulef, who took a pencil from the table during a hearing and used it to attempt to stab her in the neck.
Garrido Caniulef was being investigated for robbery with intimidation. The attack occurred at the moment when the judge ordered his preventive detention.
"He was not agitated or angry with me"
The defender recounted that before the hearing she had met with Garrido to review his procedural situation. In that prior meeting she detected no signs of aggression.
"I met previously with this person. We spoke, he did not appear agitated, obviously concerned about his procedural situation, but he was not agitated or angry with me about anything in particular," Sánchez stated in conversation with Reportajes Teletrece.
The hearing proceeded normally at first. The prosecution requested the preventive detention of the accused and the defender opposed that precautionary measure. During proceedings, Garrido asked her about the possibility of appealing and the procedure to follow.
"The truth is that it seemed as though he was receiving well the questions and the answers I was giving him. Until, well, he became flustered and something happened," the lawyer recalled. According to her account, everything had proceeded normally until the judge ordered preventive detention.
Instinctive reaction stopped the attack
It was immediately after that ruling when Garrido took the pencil that Sánchez herself had left on the table and directed it towards her neck. The defender's instinctive reaction, placing her hands in the neck area, and the intervention of the Carabineros to subdue the accused managed to stop the assault. The judge activated the panic button to initiate emergency protocols.
Mario Palma, lawyer for the Public Defender's Office, explained that "this action was only interrupted because our client, in an instinctive act, places her hands near her neck and prevents this pencil, with the force with which it was directed, from piercing her neck".
Formalisation and sentences
Garrido Caniulef was charged with attempted murder against his defender and remained in preventive detention. For this crime he risks a sentence of between 15 and 20 years in prison, with the possibility of life imprisonment, according to the evidence presented in the report.
Palma also stated that the incident should serve to update security protocols: "This could contribute to updating some protocols that were necessary to update regarding security measures, which perhaps should have been implemented with greater care".
Source: Google News CL — Santiago