Eduardo Cabrita’s defense on Tuesday said it was “normal” for an Évora court to uphold the refusal to charge the ex-minister over a fatal collision on the A6 motorway, understanding that it was consistent with what “happened” in the accident.
“To me this seems normal and consistent with what actually happened and my opinion regarding responsibility for this accident,” lawyer Manuel Magalhães e Silva told Lusa.
The lawyer was commenting on the decision of the Court of Appeal of Évora (TRE) to reject the appeals of the family and the association and to uphold the decision not to bring criminal proceedings against Eduardo Cabrita in the case of a fatal collision on Highway 6 (A6).
Lusa also contacted the lawyers of the family of the downed worker and the Association of Citizens Mobilized on Automobiles (ACA-M), José Joaquim Barros and Paulo Graça respectively, but both have so far declined to comment on the decision. , since they did not yet know the ruling.
The former minister’s lawyer said the case “was no longer a traffic accident, but a political issue” because “the assessment of the minister’s political responsibility and ethical responsibility was at stake.”
“The death is certainly regrettable, and what was done to Dr. Eduardo Cabrita is also regrettable, but I understand, since I am old enough to know the country, that such things happen and under identical circumstances they will continue to happen,” he emphasized. .
Magalhães e Silva argued that “no one would think” of blaming the accident on a person traveling “in his car with a driver, sitting in the back seat and not paying attention to what the driver is doing.”
“This came to ACA-M’s mind because it actually led to the dissemination of information about the association’s own cause,” he criticized.
When asked by Lusa how Eduardo Cabrita perceived the TRE decision, the lawyer limited himself to saying that the former minister “was happy, which is natural.”
The TRE’s decision was announced in a statement signed today by the President of this court, Judge Albertina Pedroso, and published on the institution’s website.
“The appeals against the order filed by the family of the deceased and the Association of Motorized Citizens have been decided by the order issued today,” the statement said.
According to the court, “the three judges who reviewed this TRE” decided to “unanimously dismiss the appeals as without merit and affirm in their entirety the instructive non-indictment decision rendered at first instance.”
This court decision was made after appeals against an instructional decision not to prosecute the former minister, submitted by the Association of Automobile-Mobilized Citizens (AGA-M) and the family of the deceased worker.
When the appeals were made public on March 20 this year, the family and ACA-M’s lawyers, José Joaquim Barros and Paulo Graça, respectively, told Lusa that when the TRE made a decision, it would be final.
The rejected appeals requested that the former interior minister be brought to trial, contrary to the decision not to prosecute Cabrit, signed in mid-November 2023 by criminal judge Marcos Ramos.
On June 18, 2021, Nuno Santos, an employee of a company carrying out repair work on the A6 motorway in the municipality of Évora, was killed by a car carrying the then Minister of the Interior.
As for the driver of the vehicle, Marco Pontes, he is on trial for committing the crime of authorship of the materials in the final form of murder due to gross negligence in combination with the practice of committing an “administrative offense classified as grave.” provided by traffic regulations.
However, the judge decided not to prosecute Marco Pontes for dangerous driving of a road vehicle.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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