António Martins, known as the “Terror of Pedrógão”, land in the municipality of Vidigueira where he resided, begins to be tried, this Monday, in the Court of Beja, for a dozen thefts in homes and cars, in that Alentejo village.
The 38-year-old defendant has already been sentenced to a total of 19 years in prison in different cases. He was arrested between June 2012 and October 2020, but as soon as he got out of jail, he returned to criminality.
In the new indictment of the Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP) of Cuba, the “Terror of Pedrógão” is accused of 12 crimes, some consummated and others attempted, but all aggravated, by recidivism.
The suspect attacked houses whose owners were absent and, in the consummated thefts, took money, food, drinks and other goods. He was arrested on October 20, 2022, in the center of Pedrógão, following breaking a window in the car of Noémia Ramos, former commander of the Volunteer Fire Department of Vidigueira, to try to steal the car radio and a coat, valued at one thousand euros. A member of the public who had already been a victim of the suspect prevented him from getting out of the car, calling the GNR, who stopped him.
Present in court, the defendant was subject to a coercive measure requiring him to stay in the house, with electronic surveillance, but violated it a month later and was remanded in custody.
In the order of indictment, the MP maintains that “the defendant demonstrates with his life path and successive criminal convictions in sentences that deprived him of liberty for several years that he did not adapt his behavior to social rules”. He added that he has always lived “without holding an address or stable job and has not endeavored to acquire work habits that would allow him to have a source of lawful income”, he justifies.
