Miguel Ángel del Río, Aída Victoria Merlano’s lawyer, insisted on the innocence of his attorney – credit Colprensa and Miguel Ángel del Río/website
The judicial process of the influencer Aída Victoria Merlano Manzaneda, who was sentenced to more than 13 years in prison for participating in the escape of her mother, former representative Aída Merlano Rebolledo, has generated noise among those who say that she was part of the authorship of the escape, like those who claim that he was only an accomplice.
This dilemma has been decisive for the entire litigation to which the 24-year-old girl has been subjected. In fact, her lawyer, Miguel Ángel del Río, continues to maintain that the young woman is innocent, according to his analysis.
In recent statements he gave in an interview with Blu Radio, the jurist assured that “my defense was betting on the absence of criminal responsibility, for me there is no crime here.” His thesis is based on the fact that if “the fact that Aída Victoria knew that her mother was going to escape from her made her criminally responsible, the answer is no!”
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That is why he expanded the assertion, while expressing that he did expect the increase in prison time – which in the first instance of the trial was 7 years -, “because the trial judge was wrong in his assessment of the punitive dosage. She is initially accused of being a co-author of the crime of prisoner escape. Within the conditions made by the judge on which we appealed, it was established that she was not a co-author but rather an accomplice,” she explained.
Aída Victoria Merlano was sentenced to more than 13 years in prison – credit Colpresa montage Infobae
He added that “that eventuality could not be made by the trial judge because, in criminal matters, there is a principle of congruence, that is, what is alleged by the Prosecutor’s Office and established in the indictment must be considered in the judgment. In that sense, there was an error”, given that he appealed to the “criminal responsibility” of the young woman, while the Prosecutor’s Office appealed to the sentence time that had been established after the change of status from co-authorship to accomplice in the escape of the former official.
The defender maintained that despite the conviction in the second instance, he will proceed to continue his case with the slogan that “for me there is no crime here.” “That is what I was looking for at that time and it is what I am looking for today, furthermore, because we will go to the Supreme Court of Justice; So, I was not interested in giving that debate, mine was on the criminal issue.”
Aída Merlano escaped from the authorities, while attending a dental appointment, in April 2019 – credit
In addition, she criticized the judicial system for intensifying the trial against the content creator from a gender perspective. “Justice has not judged with the same rigor those who have been behind, for example, Mrs. Merlano (Aída Victoria’s mother). The political clans of the coast remain intact; “But a woman who decided to confront them, who came to the country to seek justice, regarding which a principle of opportunity is being processed, well, she is persecuted.”
He asserted that “the judicial authorities ended up accepting a position that was quite far removed from the assessment process and ended up condemning it. But from the beginning, this persecution against Aída Merlano’s daughter was absolutely grotesque, degrading.”
Aída Victoria Merlano’s defender assured that the judicial process against his client has not been as rigorous as those that have been advanced against the “clans of the coast” – credit: @arturocharc – migueldelrioabg / Instagram
Even so, the Attorney General’s Office affirmed that Aída Victoria did play a key role in bringing in essential elements for her mother’s escape.
While the process continues, lawyer Del Río continues to seek to annul the sentence, which he describes as “unfair.” This action has been supported by voices such as that of criminal lawyer Iván Cancino, who emphatically maintains in
Furthermore, he questioned the robustness of the evidence used in the process and stated that it does not demonstrate Merlano’s “criminal responsibility.”