MIAMI, United States. – The Cuban regime rescheduled the trial against the young activist Sulmira Martínez Pérez for next Friday, November 8, according to statements by her mother, Norma Pérez Ferrer, to Cuban Diary.
The woman found out about the trial through the previous lawyer: “I called her and she told me that it was next Friday. He told me with fear and I immediately informed Sulmira. In the prison they had only told him that it would be in November, but not the exact day.”
“Now Sulmira does not have a lawyer; The one he had no longer wants to defend it. He didn’t give any explanations, he just doesn’t want to,” Pérez Ferrer lamented.
“The lawyer [anterior] He told me that they would assign another lawyer, but he warned that this one has a trial on the same day, November 8,” Pérez Ferrer explained. “No one wants to take charge of the Sulmira case; It’s a hot potato. Now I have to look for another lawyer,” he lamented.
This would be the third attempt to hold the trial against the activist. Previously, in August and September, the authorities suspended the hearings: the first time without giving explanations and the second at Sulmira’s request, because her lawyer was hospitalized.
At 22 years old, Martínez Pérez has been in provisional prison since January 2023. He did not receive the prosecutor’s request until last June, in which he is accused of “crime against the constitutional order” and “contempt.” The Prosecutor’s Office requests a joint sentence of 10 years of deprivation of liberty. According to his mother, the document “is full of lies.”
The authorities base their accusations on publications that the young woman made on her social networks, where she urged Cubans to protest. In one of his messages he wrote: “We need organization… Spread the word! We plan another July 11“. According to the regime, these actions sought to “change the political, economic and social order established in the Constitution of the Republic.”
Despite having no criminal record, the Prosecutor’s Office has kept Martínez Pérez under a “precautionary measure of provisional detention” for more than a year and a half. He is also accused of “collecting several bottles” to supposedly make “Molotov cocktails” and throwing them at the Las Guásimas store. However, the tax document itself admits that no such bottles were found during the search of his home.
In April 2023, Sulmira was featured on the National Television News making a self-incrimination that, according to her mother, was obtained “under pressure.”
In June of the same year, the young woman’s mother denounced publicly that she was depressed in prison due to the hostile treatment received by the authorities and feared that her situation could lead her to make an attempt on her life.
Lawyer Giselle Morfi, from the Cubalex Legal Information Center, has pointed out the multiple rights violations in the young woman’s case, including arbitrary detention, lack of a fair trial, violation of privacy and torture.
