Drug trafficking: the cassation ratified the convictions of 17 people for selling drugs, even from prison

There Federal Chamber of Criminal Cassation confirmed the sentences handed down by the Federal Oral Criminal Court of Rosario, province of Santa Fe, to a drug trafficking organization consisting of 17 people. The sale was organized from prison. The sentences reach up to 7 and a half years for those who have fulfilled more important roles. In only one case was there an order, by majority, to set aside a consolidation of sentences. The sentencing upheld the confiscation of the motorcycles and cars they used to sell drugs.

The judgment was signed by the judges Gustavo M. Hornos, Javier Carbajo and Mariano Hernán Borinsky. In the sentence, it was considered proven that there was an organization dedicated to drug trafficking in the south of the province of Santa Fe and, basically, in the city of Venado Tuerto.

According to the investigation, some of the organization’s members coordinated the sale and obtained the drugs while they were being held in a prison. The conviction of the defendants was mainly based on the result of the numerous searches carried out in various homes and cells and on the telephone calls which revealed the marketing they carried out and the role each played.

According to the sentence, to which GlobeLiveMedia, The case began in 2018 when the personnel of the Venado Tuerto sub-delegation of the Argentine Federal Police reported that, through information obtained on public roads, it was learned that in an internal house located in Monseñor Borgarino streets and Vieytes of this city, maneuvers of selling drugs were carried out. These data coincided with what was reported by the investigative police of Santa Fe: an anonymous call to 911 also reported that “el gordo Castelli” was domiciled at this address and would be engaged in the sale of narcotics.

Once the procedure was received, the Federal Court of Venado Tuerto delegated the investigation to the public prosecutor’s office: the investigative missions confirmed the suspicions. On November 20, 2018, the police personnel in charge of the investigation accompanied the first part of the analysis of the telephone intervention of the owner of the house, Natalí Castelli, then girlfriend of Sebastián López who was detained in the prison of Coronda, and would be the one who supplied drugs to his partner. From there, the subscriber of the named was obtained and his intervention was requested with a favorable reception by the acting federal judge.

It was also possible to obtain the number of a telephone subscriber used by a woman who was selling drugs from her home on Calle San Luis, provided to her by Castelli herself. The woman’s name was Georgina Fernández, a partner of Fabricio Monsalvo who was also detained in Unit 1 in Coronda. In addition, he reported that the San Luis Street address mentioned above belonged to Belén Fernández and that his sister Georgina frequented it at night. Additionally, it was reported that Georgina was in conversation with another woman named Florencia, from the town of Melincué, for issues related to drug trafficking.

According to research, Sebastián López shared a cell with inmate Lucas Spada from the town of Rufino, to whom he also gave narcotics for later resale in that town, through his partner, named Natalí or “Morena”. Then, in a new report produced by the VIII Operational Anti-Narcotics Brigade in which the telephone tapping carried out by the couple composed of López and Castelli has been analyzed, it is clear that they were supplied with narcotics by a man in the vicinity from Coronda prison.

In mid-January 2019, new telephone communications following the successive interventions in the case established that “the Monsalvo investigated is called Fabricio Martín, and that he used two telephone lines, one belonging to a prison cellmate, named Martin Cardozo”. The wiretaps speak of a drug dealer nicknamed “Palín”.

The investigation established that “the alleged illicit activity investigated had specific geographical reference points, such as the Coronda prison unit, a place not far away – in the same locality -, and the towns of Venado Tuerto, Firmat, Rufino and the town of Mélincue On the other hand, a certain connection also arises with people who, although they have not been fully identified, would be located in the towns of Santa Fe and Rosario.

The searches took place in February 2019: narcotic substances were seized and items commonly used for their fractionation and/or packaging for further sale were seized, such as transparent nylon fittings, scales, etc Cristian Leonardo Pérez, Luciano Colombano, Jesús Alberto Beltrán, Lucas Videla Mirazú, Á.TB, Natalí Rafaela Castelli, Juliana Chávez, Natalí Macedo González, Maira Jaquelina Crespo, Rosa Haydee Rodríguez, Romina Diana Rocío Pietrocola, Lucas Spada, Fabricio Monsalvo have been arrested ., Sebastián López, Martín Cardozo and Horacio Luciano Rene.

The prosecution understood that the investigation was centered on two groups, one led by Sebastián López and the other by Fabricio Monsalvo, and that each had the executing arm of their respective partners. In this understanding, he explained that the subjects, who were detained in Coronda prison, had established links with different suppliers of narcotic material and that their respective partners were responsible for connecting with them and then redistributing them in the different places. from the south of the Province of Santa Fe.

During the trial, the court confirmed that “the couple Spada and Macedo directly marketed the drugs supplied or supplied by López and Castelli, being the last links in the chain of trafficking, but Monsalvo and Fernández occupied an intermediate position, since to transport outside of the said activity, they had several people who then marketed the narcotic at retail”.

Both for the court and for the cassation, the sentences were set between 7 and a half to three years in prison for drug trafficking for the 17 involved.

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