The judge of Fourth Court of Instruction dictated opening of substantive judgment against Fausto Miguel Cruz de la Motathe “friend” and “almost brother” of Minister Orlando Jorge Merawhom he killed with six shots.
Judge Altagracia Ramírez accepted the request of the Public ministry and of the victim’s relatives, the latter say they will prove that Cruz de la Mota “is a coward” who acted out of his murderous instinct to take the life of the prominent political leader and official, said lawyer Miguel Vaerio.
Upon leaving the court, Cruz de la Mota, who is nicknamed “Carandai”, reiterated that he acted in self-defense and that he went to the Ministry of the Environment to collect a debt of 3 million dollars that was owed to him for construction work. political character.
Explaining his statement, his lawyer Moisés Fontnilla said that his client argues that he has been importing arms for 30 years and that he was a solvent person, not a “pedilón”.
Regarding the fact that he committed the crime in self-defense, Fontanilla indicates that Cruz de la Mota argues that the victim had a revolver in his right pants pocket that he himself had given it to him.
“I have told him, and we have raised it, that he does not need to question the recognized honor of the deceased Orlando Jorge Mera that everyone recognizes him as an honorable man. He is raising his arguments and we as lawyers obviously do not We are going to contradict and we are going to make all the pertinent efforts”asserts Fontanilla.
Joege Mera was killed in his office of the Ministry of the Environment on June 6 of last year.
According to the accusation, Cruz de la Mota arrived at 12:00 noon at the Environment headquarters, located on Avenida Cayetano Germosén with Gregorio Luperón. And a few minutes after entering the minister’s office and being both alone, because Jorge Mera told his security to come out, fired six shots at him.
The shots were fired from a Taurus brand gun, 380 caliber, serial No. KXL44043. and they impacted the victim on the head, face, front and back thorax, and left hand, “causing hemorrhage, contusion, and laceration of the encephalic mass, according to the record of removal of the body No.61610 of the National Institute of Forensic Sciences (Inacif) ”.
After murdering his childhood friend, Miguel Cruztook advantage of the desperation of the building employees and left by a staircase and went to a church where, via the priest, he turned himself in to the Police.
In the request for a measure of coercion, the MP had maintained that the motive for the crime was the rejection of a license for Aurum Gavia, a special permit, which would allow them to export some five thousand tons of used batteries, which was rejected by the ill-fated official.
