The Prosecutor’s Office presented its witnesses in the case against Martha Candelaria Rivas Hernández, accused of “false testimony” after denying that Father Manuel Salvador García beat her. Despite this, the priest was sentenced to two years in prison for the alleged crime of threatening five people with a weapon. Among the complainants is Rivas’ ex-partner as a “key witness”.
In expanding the evidence against Nandaime’s father, the Prosecutor’s Office decided to present Rivas Hernández’s ex-husband to “declare” that the citizen was attacked by the priest on the night of May 30. In addition to being in charge of affirming that she “has had a relationship with the priest since 2021 and that he authorized, that they make a second statement to her 15-year-old daughter,” according to the information published by the digital media Despacho 505 .
Related news: They will present “new” evidence against Father Manuel García for alleged “aggression”
Through the advance of evidence, the young woman had confirmed her mother’s version, since she pointed out that the blow she had near her nose was accidental, and that it was in a moment of desperation that she asked people who were in front of the church for help. , a situation that later led the priest to go out as a defense thinking that the inhabitants wanted to enter the temple.
The accusation and sentence against Father Manuel García was based on a video from May 30 released on social networks where the priest came out with a machete, allegedly threatening a group of people who were besieging the Jesús Nazareno parish in Nandaime, after accusing the priest for having attacked Rivas Hernández, who weeks later was arrested by the Ortega Police for the alleged crime of “false testimony.”
Father Manuel García was arrested on June 1, being the first priest to be kept behind bars by the Ortega dictatorship, accusing him of common crimes. The priest joins more than 190 political prisoners in Nicaragua.
Related news: Justice of Ortega sentences Father Manuel García to two years in prison
During the trial against the citizen, the Prosecutor’s Office will also include another statement that the fifteen-year-old gave to the Police with the consent of her father, in which she indicates that her mother frequently argued with the priest when he checked her cell phone and that that night in May , physically attacked each other when they were in the parish house.
Despite the fact that the alleged victim of “violence” retracted the accusation he made before the official media against the priest García Rodríguez, the justice of the Ortega regime keeps the case open for him, accusing him of the crime of aggression. The court applied the sentence against him on Wednesday, June 22, of two years in prison plus a 200-day fine, equivalent to 14,116 cordobas.
