He raised his head slightly, glanced sideways and managed a half smile. “Yes, he did not know where she was going, clearly she was not from here. They themselves used to say that whoever came here for wool would end up sheared“said one of the neighbors. A married couple, owner of a kiosk in Peñarol, killed a criminal at noon this Thursday. The two, former police officers, had already done the same in 2010, 2012 and 2018 (this last time the criminal did not die.) His neighbors are divided between those who affirm that they would have done the same and those who condemn “his cruelty” by cutting short the life of a “guri who had no opportunities”.
The man, who had no criminal record, entered the store threatening those present with a weapon. That earned him the woman shot him. He walked wounded a few meters, fell and died. The police took a statement from her and the Homicide prosecutor Carlos Negro also did so, although he will also summon the woman to the Prosecutor’s Office.
In 2010, 2012 and 2018, he had similar episodes, which fell under the article of self-defense. That made the criminals in the area not return. They also boasted about it, the neighbors agree.
Although they affirm that the situation has been diminishing for a year and a half, all the residents consulted have suffered in one way or another from insecurity. It is a busy street, which has a bus stop in which some passengers have been victims.
“They are lucky that they stole my rifle, because I would have done the same thing. In that minute, between your life and theirs, you shoot it down. Here they enter someone’s property to steal what someone built like hotdogs for their house “said a security guard who, in dialogue with The Observer, He preferred not to be identified. A night watchman who works on a nearby property said the opposite: “It is known that anyone who crosses the line is shot down. I hope he never touches me, but if one day he touches me – and I tell you looking you “I’m going to carry the weight of killing someone all my life. They don’t mind killing a guru who didn’t have a chance, surely.” When I walked through the door today, I said ‘another one’. The neighborhood commissioners are believed.
The positions of the neighbors are amplified in the parliamentary debates, in which the legislators returned to discuss relatively recently the limits of legitimate defense.
The political debate on legitimate defense
“Surely this case will fit in with legitimate defense,” said the Minister of the Interior, Luis Alberto Heber, regarding the case being investigated by the Negro prosecutor. Beyond the fact that this new episode finds them with a change in legislation, the three previous cases had been framed in the same figure.
The first article of the LUC introduces three changes in matters of legitimate defense. The first describes that the gardens, barbecues, patios, balconies, terraces, roof terraces, barbecues, garages and carports are dependencies of the house. In addition, sheds, installations or the like that are part of the establishment are considered dependencies of the house in suburban or rural areas, provided they are reasonably close to the dwelling.
Another change introduced by the LUC was to clarify that the means used to defend oneself will be considered rational when it turns out to be a sufficient and adequate response in order to avert the danger derived from the aggression suffered.
And that “when the defense must be exercised with respect to any right of patrimonial content, rationality must be assessed regardless of the fact that a physical aggression against the person defending himself has not existed or has already ceased.”
Three weeks before the referendum, this article of the law slipped into all the debates. The last case was in the debate between Senators Gustavo Penadés (National Party) and Mario Bergara (Frente Amplio). “The LUC has been in force for almost two years, none of the issues reported by Senator Bergara happened. They don’t shoot around the neighborhoods, no one has been killed disproportionately in alleged legitimate defense, far from it. Talking that we are throwing bells on the fly in relation to the success of the fight against crime is not like that, but we are much better,” Penadés alleged then.
But on that argument, the legislator from the Front responded: “You have to find out more, Of course there have been people killed in very questionable legitimate defense circumstances. (…), a person was shooting with peons who were about to fumigate a property”.
