An Argentine federal court on Wednesday began the oral trial of the three defendants accused of the attempted murder in 2022 by former Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, a central figure in politics over the past two decades.
He process has as defendants to Fernando Sabag Montiel, who on September 1, 2022 fired a gun at the head of the then vice president (2019-2023) in the middle of a public street; his then partner Brenda Uliarte, considered co-author of the attempted attack, and Nicolás Carrizo, close to both of them and who is accused of being a secondary participant.
More than 200 witnesses will be called to the court, including the former president (2007-2015), who is also a plaintiff and is dissatisfied with the investigation carried out by the courts, considering that it did not delve into the ideological authorship of the attack and suspects that opposition sectors could have planned and financed it.
Fernández de Kirchner said that the investigation avoided “knowing the truth.”
The three detainees, who were present at the first hearing, are also known as “La Banda de los Copitos.” Sabag Montiel, a Brazilian national who has lived in Argentina for decades, worked alongside Uliarte selling cotton candy, allegedly under Carrizo’s orders.
The main defendant in the foiled attack said in a journalistic interview in 2023 from prison that he acted alone and tried to disassociate his partner and any opposition group. He said the bullet did not come out because he got nervous and that he did not regret the act. The other two defendants have maintained their innocence.
During the first hearing, the court clerk read out the prosecution’s requests for referral to trial and the complaint, which details the accusations.
Carlos Rívolo, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation, considered in mid-2023 that there was no evidence of political financing or planning of the attempted murder and asked federal judge María Eugenia Capuchetti to send the case to trial. The judge had delegated the investigation to the prosecutor because Fernández de Kirchner questioned his impartiality.
Rívolo said that all the evidence gathered up to that point prevented considering that there had been “an organization of any kind, political party or partisan, person or group of people who had, in some way, financed, planned, covered up or contributed in some way to the accused in carrying out the investigated act.”
The attempted murder took place in front of the Buenos Aires home of the then vice president, now 71 years old, where hundreds of her followers had gathered to support her when an oral trial was taking place against her for alleged corruption. Later, this process resulted in Fernández de Kirchner being sentenced to six years in prison and disqualified for life from holding public office for the crime of defrauding the State, which the political leader appealed.
In the middle of that group of supporters were Sabag Montiel and his girlfriend. When the then vice president approached, the man pointed a Bersa pistol about 20 centimeters from his face and fired it. According to experts, the bullet did not come out because it was not in the chamber.
The murder attempt was not noticed by the guard and the arrest of the aggressor was carried out by a group of militants of the Peronist leader who witnessed the maneuver and picked up the weapon from the ground.
During the course of the investigation, Fernández de Kirchner requested that other lines of investigation be investigated in depth, such as those related to an opposition deputy and a far-right group in some of whose protests Uliarte participated, which are not part of the case file submitted to trial and are being analyzed separately.
Although the three detainees had no political affiliation, they were very active on social networks against the government of then-president Alberto Fernández and especially against the vice president.
The oral process is expected to last for a year.
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