The Second Chamber of the Criminal Court of Appeals ordered the immediate release of Lucinda Eva Marina Marroquín, prosecuted in the Hogar Seguro case, which arose after the death in a fire of 41 girls who were under state protection, judicial sources reported on Wednesday.
Marroquín was in preventive detention, but with the Court’s decision he will be released with an alternative measure.
Last January, Lucinda Eva Marroquín’s defense requested that they be granted alternative measures to house arrest, but the judge in charge denied that request and ordered them to remain in preventive detention.
Judge Ingrid Vanessa Cifuentes, head of the Seventh Criminal Sentencing Court, The court ruled inadmissible the request for alternative measures submitted by Marroquín’s defense, so he had to remain in preventive detention while the trial continued.
Lucinda Eva Marroquín was a PNC sub-inspector when the events occurred and her defense requested house arrest and submit to telematic control.
“This Chamber (…) declares with the appeal being granted requested by the defendant Lucinda Eva Marina Marroquin Carrillo, with the assistance of the defense attorney Jorge Hector Ernesto Paul Pineda, against the resolution issued by the Seventh Criminal Sentencing Court, Drug Trafficking and Crimes Against the Environment of Guatemala, dated May 30, 2024. Consequently, the contested resolution is revoked and is left without legal and judicial effects,” the resolution says.
He also added that “the preventive detention order is revoked.” that the defendant has been suffering from,” so “freedom is ordered of the processed.
However, Marroquín is prohibited from leaving the country without authorization from the competent body; prohibited from communicating with the procedural subjects, accused witnesses or experts and has the obligation to put your fingerprint within the biometric control or sign the book authorized by the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
The facts
According to the Public Ministry (MP), the incidents that led to the death of the 41 girls would have started on March 7, 2017, when a group of minors tried to escape of the from the Safe Home of the Virgin of the Assumption for alleged mistreatment by the authorities of that place.
According to the account of the public prosecutor Edgar Gomez, after the incidents 56 teenagers were locked in a room where they were crammed together, and one of them would have set fire to one of the mattresses that were in the enclosure.
He added that the request for help would have been ignored by the authorities and This resulted in the death of 19 minors on site and another 22 who died in health centers; In addition, 15 were burned.