The owner of a vehicle in which a German couple and two 10- and 11-year-old girls reported in Germany as “disappeared” traveled through Paraguay, was questioned this Wednesday by the Prosecutor’s Office, judicial sources reported.
Source: AFP
The subject, identified as Diego Martínez (35), confirmed having lent a truck a month ago to the couple who is a fugitive with the girls wanted in Paraguay.
“The suspect entered into several contradictions,” Commissioner Cristian Cáceres, of the Police Anti-Kidnapping Unit, told reporters, who took him to Asunción to present him to the Public Ministry.
“First he said that the couple was introduced to him by a relative but then he said it was a client,” after reporting as a car mechanic in the city of Villarrica, the commissioner said.
In a conversation with Universo 970 of Grupo Nación Media, prosecutor Karina Sánchez indicated that the detained mechanic testified, provided data to the investigation and was later released.
The vehicle, a Nissan pickup, was rented by 46-year-old Andreas Rainer Egler.
The German citizen is accused of being responsible for the illegal possession of the girls Clara Magdalena Egler, 10, and Lara Valentina Blank, 11, who disappeared from their country last November and were last seen in January in Paraguay.
Egler, father of Clara Magdalena, is a fugitive along with his new wife, Ana María Egler (Scharpf, maiden name), who is also the mother of Lara Valentina Blank.
Clara Magdalena’s mother, Anne Maja Reiniger-Egler, is in Asunción leading the search and authorized at a press conference on Monday the dissemination of the disappearance case by all the local media.
– Life on the run –
Reiniger’s lawyer admitted this Wednesday at a press conference that the diffusion had results and that the fugitive couple manifested itself via Telegram on Tuesday with a video message, in which they demand that Clara’s mother stop the search.
“You demand that our clients agree to abandon and leave their children behind. Mrs. Anne Maja Reiniger and Mr. Filip Blank (Lara’s father) barely recognize their girls in the videos,” said lawyer Stephan Schulheiss, addressing the couple in German and Spanish.
Said video made Mrs. Reiniger enter a crisis, who had planned to attend the conference and did not. She “she saw her daughter with short, dyed hair. She didn’t seem comfortable. That affected him a lot,” she explained.
In the message to the captors, the lawyer Schultheiss warned that the search process is carried out independently of the will of his client.
“The authorities are investigating in Paraguay, Germany and through Interpol, all over the world,” said the lawyer.
“The well-being of the girls is not compatible with a life on the run that you have chosen. End this extremely stressful situation for everyone. Please manifest yourself,” she emphasized.
The lawyer reiterated that Clara’s mother and Lara’s father “are not interested in obtaining a sentence” of punishment.
“They want to find a solution that allows everyone a future of peace and a return to normal life. The opportunity is open to you,” she declared.
“We are convinced that the girls and the couple are still in Paraguay,” the head of Anti-Kidnapping, Commissioner Mario Vallejos, remarked earlier, who said he feared, however, that they could leave for Argentina or Brazil through the triple border (between Ciudad del Este , Foz de Iguazú and Puerto Iguazú).
“There is a third person supporting the couple,” said the police officer.
