The June 2017 Pedrogane Grande fire trial, in which 11 defendants were acquitted by the Leiria Judicial Court, will be referred to the Coimbra Court of Appeal this Monday, a source in the judiciary told Lusa.
On September 13, 2022, the court of 1st instance acquitted all defendants in the case of crimes related to negligent homicide and negligent bodily harm, some of which were serious. During this process, the Public Ministry (MP) counted 63 dead and 44 injured wanted in criminal cases.
Most of the dead were found on Estrada Nacional 236-1, which connects Castaneira de Pera with Figueiro dos Viños. The sub-concession for the Pinhal Interior road, which included this road, was awarded to Ascendi Pinhal Interior, which was in charge of fuel management.
The MP appealed against the acquittals of seven defendants, including Augusto Arno, commander of the Pedrogan Grande Volunteer Firefighters, and former President and Vice President of the Chamber, Valdemar Alves and José Graça, respectively. He also appealed the acquittal of Margarida Gonçalves, who at the time was in charge of the Forestry Department in that municipality, and of three Ascendi employees (Jose Reves, Hugo Berardinelli and Rogerio Mota).
The parents of a firefighter who died in the fires have also filed an appeal against the former mayor of Castaneira de Pera, Fernando López.
Two people, who lost a total of five family members in these fires, appealed the acquittal against the fire commander and three Ascendi employees.
There was no appeal against the acquittal of former EDP Distribuição (currently E-REDES) employees José Geria and Casimiro Pedro, and the mayor of Figueiro dos Vinhos, Jorge Abreu.
The case file is submitted to the Court of Appeal along with these resources and the corresponding responses from the defendants. The resources in which the deputy retained interest are also on the rise, one of which is on the distribution process.
The deputy questioned the classification of the file as a megaprocess and defended the new distribution.
On January 18, 2021, he declared to the court about the “invalidity and incorrectness of the distribution”, considering that “the principle of the natural judge could be called into question.”
In response, the judge in charge of the case and presiding over the collective court, Maria Clara Santos, assured that the distribution of the records was carried out “in a completely electronic and random manner using a computer application used in the judiciary.” “, so that “there are no insignificances or procedural violations.”
In a clarification posted on his website at the time, the District Attorney of Leiria County clarified that with this appeal, he intended to avoid a repeat of the trial.
The next day, May 24, the day the trial began, the President of the Collective Court accepted this appeal by the Prosecutor’s Office, determining that it would be transferred to the Relação de Coimbra after the trial, that is, “in the case file”. by itself, together with an appeal against the decision that ends the case, with a simply devolutive effect.
The MP requested that this appeal be granted with suspensive effect, which would determine that the trial did not start that day.
In the ruling governing the transfer of the records to the Coimbra Relation dated the 20th, the judge reiterated that the distribution “was carried out in a completely electronic, random, inviolable and secure manner using a computer application used in the courts. , implemented and controlled exclusively by IGFEJ [Instituto de Gestão Financeira e Equipamentos da Justiça]”.
Author: Portuguese
Source: CM Jornal
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