Yosvany Batista Gómez, father of Zidan Batista Álvarez, the young died at the hands of the police in Santa Clara, has forcefully attacked the official version of events in El Condado.
In a post on his Facebook wall, the father of the victim affirms that he wants to “refute what was said by the National Television Newscast”, because “the facts are not as stated by said broadcast medium”. “Who better than me, who is his father, to disprove this media,” says the man, who was in the place and can give “testimony to the true origin of the events.”
Regarding Zidan, Batista Gómez assures that a “public order agent unnecessarily murdered him, and beat him to the ground.” He was “no antisocial”, as the note from the Ministry of the Interior describes him, and although he had a criminal record, this does not justify being called “scum”. Batista Gómez confirmed that his son had participated in the massive protests of July 11, a fact known since this Saturday as a result of a personal investigation of the opposition Guillermo Fariñasresident in the same city.
The events could have been avoided, says Batista Gómez, “if the Police of the Fifth Unit of Santa Clara had acted correctly, taking the corresponding measures with those who caused the problem.”
He asserts that on several occasions he filed complaints at the police station against the people who “had my son and his wife [Susleidy Guerra] threatened with death,” and identifies Dailis Díaz Cuella (sic), her children Melisa and Edgar, and other people who accompanied them as responsible for the fight.
The publication reports that the Police attacked Batista Gómez and Zidan “without asking.” The man lost sight of his son and was immobilized by several agents. He then heard two shots and saw Zidan lying on the ground.
“I will continue processing until I reach the president of the nation, of that you can be more than sure, and it is the best thing that can happen to him and the other three policemen who beat him on the floor after he died”
“I lost control, I shook myself and I managed to get away from the policemen who were holding me and I went to try to save my son. I went to help him, but I couldn’t. He fell out of my hands and I ran after the policeman, who also shot me to the feet,” he added. Out of control, she demanded that he be shot in the head or chest, as they had done with his son.
Batista Gómez describes that Zidan suffered two shots: in the thigh and in the chest. He died from internal bleeding caused by this last projectile, which hit the lung. “The problem was not with the Police, it was with the aforementioned people,” adds the man. The agent opened fire “unnecessarily” because there were “more options to disarm him. I myself would have taken the machete from him and nothing would have happened.”
In his publication, Batista Gómez directly questions the journalists of the Noticiero Nacional de Televisión and in particular its director, Lázaro Manuel Alonso, offering them his address “if they want argue [sic] good of the facts”. She also demands that her son’s death not become an “object of propaganda”.
Finally, he asks that the Cuban military prosecutor’s office do justice to the police officer who killed Zidan, with badge number 15388, and three other agents. “If this is not the case,” he guarantees, “I will continue processing until I reach the president of the nation, of that you can be more than sure, and it is the best thing that can happen to him and the other three police officers who beat him on the floor after death”.
The version of events released by Yosvany Batista Gómez openly contradicts the note from the Ministry of the Interior, which describes Zidan as an individual “characterized by violent behavior, with multiple criminal records.”
In addition, the official statement describes the event as “an alteration of public order”, in which “two citizens were besieged by eight individuals with terrible behavior, who attacked the house with stones, carrying knives and hurling insults and threats at them.” The authorities have also not published the results of the “rigorous investigation” that they promised, nor have they offered the identity of the “citizen unrelated to the altercation” who, according to the text, was also injured by the Police.
The publication of Yosvany Batista Gómez, who identifies himself on his Facebook profile as “pastor of a Christian church”, has already received hundreds of messages of condolences for the death of his son Zidan.
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