HAVANA, Cuba.- The prisoner Ulises Machado Garcedo, 73 years old, died without receiving timely medical assistance and effective on Saturday, January 11 at the Kilo 8 prison in Camagüey, as reported by political prisoner Alieski Calderín Acosta via telephone on the 14th of the same month.
Ulises Machado Garcedo was a neighbor of the Amalia Simoni neighborhood in the city of Camagüey. At the time of his death he had served 20 years of a life prison sentence for the crime of murder.
According to Calderín Acosta, the deceased showed symptoms of senile dementia, as he spent most of the day and night vociferating and muttering incoherent phrases. He had spent the last ten months in a punishment regime (without shoes, without sheets and without a mattress) and had recently been taken out of the area where life prisoners are held to place him in front of his cell, supposedly as a “security measure” for order of the director of the prison, Lieutenant Colonel Juan Miguel Sánchez Duarte, but in the opinion of the political prisoner, with the intention of psychologically torturing him.
Calderín Acosta specified that the inmate fell asleep sitting on the concrete bench that serves as a bedand on more than one occasion he had fallen on his side and hit his head on the cement. As a result of these blows, according to the political prisoner, in recent weeks he had seen him bleeding from the head at least three times, for which he did not receive medical attention.
Calderín Acosta also pointed out that on January 5, Ulises Machado Garcedo fell again and was bleeding profusely. That day they took him to the infirmary and gave him a painkiller, after which, as the political prisoner learned, they left him in the common area where the rest of the prisoners are.
The political prisoner also announced that on January 7, the elderly inmate was transferred to the Amalia Simoni Provincial Hospital, as his health continued to deteriorate. Likewise, he indicated that when inquiring about his situation shortly after, the prison doctor alleged that “he had a tumor in his head and had not withstood the operation.”
Alieski Calderín Acosta is a bricklayer and is 36 years old. Before being arrested, he lived in the city of Camagüey. He appears registered as a political prisoner by the international human rights defense group based in Spain. Prisoners Defenders. According to the copy of his sentence, Calderín Acosta was sentenced to 20 years in prison for the alleged crime of sabotage for having thrown a Molotov cocktail in the early hours of November 4, 2012 at the facade of the Currency Collection Store. El Encanto, located on the boulevard of his city of residence.
