The 6th Trial Court of Aragua issued a sentence of 16 years and 8 months in prison against Ramón Celestino Rojas, who admitted his participation in the so-called Yumare Massacre, which occurred on May 8, 1986 when a police commission killed nine social leaders. judicial sources said.
At the time of the events, Rojas was working as an agent of the defunct National Directorate of Intelligence and Prevention Services (Disip), a body that executed the nine activists in the La Vaca village, Yaracuy.
The former Disip official was arrested on August 1, 2015 in the town of Onoto (Anzoátegui) by a Cicpc commission. Then the Prosecutor’s Office charged him with homicide qualified with treachery and for ignoble motives, committed in complicity to the degree of immediate cooperator.
The sentence against Rojas was imposed this Tuesday by the 6th Trial Court of Aragua in charge of Judge Israel López.
Adán Navas, lawyer for the families of the victims, asked the Executive through a statement, “to comply with article 30 of the Constitution, regarding compensation to the families.”
The victims of the Yumare Massacre are identified as Rafael Ramón Quevedo Infante, Ronald José Morao Salgado, Nelson Martín Castellano Díaz, Dilia Antonia Rojas, Luis Rafael Guzmán Green, José Rosendo Silva Medina, Pedro Pablo Jiménez García, Simón José Romero Madriz and Alfredo Caicedo Castillo.
Due to this fact, there is still to be captured, among others, the retired commissioner of the Disip Henry López Sisco, based in Costa Rica and whose extradition was agreed by the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice.
The file on the Yumare Massacre was classified until 2000 when the then Minister of Defense Raúl Salazar filed it with the Constitutional Chamber of the TSJ.
Six years later, the 6th Court of Control of Yaracuy admitted a complaint filed by relatives of the victims.
The retired general of the Army, Alexis Ramón Sánchez Paz, was the first arrested for this act. In May 2011, Sánchez Paz was sentenced to 13 years in prison after admitting his participation in the Yumare Massacre.
Others criminally prosecuted for the events that occurred in the La Vaca hamlet during the government of President Jaime Lusinchi are: Oswaldo Ramos, Eugenio Creassola, Freddy Grangger, William Prado, Adán Quero and Hernán Vega, former agents of the now-defunct Disip.
