Why the court did not apply an unlimited prison sentence to the murderers of Lucio Dupuy

The court composed of the judge Alejandra Ongaro and the judges Daniel Saez Zamora there Andres Olie who condemned Madeleine Esposito Valenti Already Abigail Perez to life imprisonment for murder Lucio Dupuy It did not give rise to requests from the prosecution and the complaint to add an ancillary penalty of indefinite duration.

Article 52 of the Penal Code provides that indefinite imprisonment shall be applied as an accessory to the sentence. in case of multiple recurrence, and in the first paragraph of article 80, in the event of qualification of aggravated homicide, empowers the judge to impose said complicity. On February 13, during the sentencing hearing, both the representatives of the public ministry Veronique Ferrero there Maximilian Pauluccibecause the complaint demanded that the murderers of Lucio be sentenced to life imprisonment plus indefinite complicity.

Plaintiff’s attorney Mario Aguerrido He adhered to the prosecution’s request and developed the arguments that, in his opinion, made unlimited imprisonment applicable, highlighting as background the cases of Arquímedes Puccio and that of the “twelve apostles” of Sierra Chica. He maintained that this sentence is imposed in extremely serious cases where the degrees of culpability and guilt are very high. He also felt that account should be taken of the conduct after the crime of Abigail Páez, who supported a strategy based on lies, which also – according to what he said – showed no regrets concrete and like Magdalena Espósito Valenti.

He also mentioned the reasons that led them to commit a crime, the nature of the act, the circumstances surrounding it and the extent of the damage that goes beyond Lucio Dupuy and manifests itself in all his family, in addition to the agitation that the act generated from the characteristics of the victim and his aggressors. However, the court refused to enforce the indefinite detention as an accomplice to the life sentence imposed on Lucio Dupuy’s killers.

Judge Andrés Olié in his vote – which the two other magistrates joined – cited the Gramajo judgment in which the Supreme Court of Justice declared such a sentence unconstitutional for cases of multiple recidivism but not for aggravated homicides. However, the magistrate stressed that “this does not prevent taking into account the doctrine that emanates from the judgment, not only to examine the constitutionality of the figure, but the relevance of its application, since article 80 of the criminal code refers to it”. as an optional measure for judges. And he added, quoting one of the recitals of this precedent “The crime – however serious – cannot be punished with life imprisonment ‘an excessively high price, which should not even be paid by those who have committed the most serious crimes in our penal system’ .”

“If the basis for the imposition of ancillary imprisonment of indefinite duration is intended to be sought in the dangerousness of the convicted person, it obviously comes up against the liberal principle which describes our criminal law as a criminal law of the act, which governs naturally the imposition of sanctions as a manifestation of the criminal law of copyright,” added Judge Olié in his vote.

She also considered that the indefinite confinement “has an eliminatory or social defense character which, in any case, aims at the extirpation of the convict from society; a paradigmatic example of special negative prevention, as the only goal. Needless to say, this defeats the purpose of resocializing the convicted person.

Finally, Judge Andrés Olié pointed out that article 14 of the Penal Code “while refusing conditional release for most crimes which merit a life sentence, on the strictly legal level, the application of imprisonment accessory to indefinite period has no possibility of becoming applicable.

The conviction may be appealed by the parties by filing an appeal within 10 days and the claim is resolved by the Court of Criminal Appeal.

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