After the three-year sentence to police officer Santiago Olmedo, the Prosecutor’s Office gives details of the investigation that led to this conviction. The trajectory of the shots is one of the most relevant points.
The case of police officer Santiago Olmedo, sentenced to three years and four months for shooting down two criminals, on June 11, 2021, in Riobamba, has sparked a social debate about the progressive use of force Y the act of justice.
Although the crime of overreach in execution of an act of service is punishable by up to 13 years in prison, Olmedo had elements that allowed reduce the sentence, but why was it not dismissed? How was overreach proven?
Patricio Parco, fiscal agent of the case, spoke with LA HORA and detailed that the ballistic trajectory and parts of Olmedo’s testimony, which could not be corroborated, were essential.
What did the Prosecutor’s Office demonstrate that served as motivation for the sentencing of Santiago Olmedo?
First you have to contextualize what happened that day. The person who was involved in this crime against property (a man who was trying to rob a minor) leaves in a hasty race, along Bypass Street (where the attempted assault took place, runs to the intercantonal terminal (…) moments before, a motorcycle came The motorcycle waits for him at the corner of Pedro León Donoso and José María Roura streets, until then, we already have 200 meters, from the place where the adolescent was and from where the adolescent did not move.
Mr. Henry C., (one of those killed and who is seen in a video wearing a black sweater) gets on the motorcycle. Behind him the already sentenced policeman was chasing him, along with another colleague, and that is where he makes use of the firearm.
Where did the shots that killed the two men occur?
It has been spread in the media and social networks that the shots could have been at the time they were helping the victim, which is not true. This occurs at 220 meters further, expertly establishedwhen the two people, deceased today, were fleeing the place.
How many shots were there?
Precisely, 12 opportunities, at least. Because six (shots) hit each of them.
What was the trajectory of the shots?
The autopsy establishes that the ballistic trajectory, in the case of Henry Bryan C., take the shots from left to right from back to front, that is, backwards.
And Diego Fabián N., (motorcycle driver) receives the shots from back to front, from right to left.
Are the meters of distance and trajectory the basis for substantiating self-defense?
Here are some questions. If someone is attacking me, the shot could not have been fired from behind. It is not only the ballistic trajectory expertise that determines this, it is the context, the more than 40 testimonies and experts presented in court.
Does this go against the international parameters of the progressive use of force?
The Inter-American Court establishes parameters such as legality, necessity and proportionality.
It is established that there was legality, because the use of the weapon is allowed. There was preparation by the members of the National Police because they receive annual training on the progressive use of force, including shooting practice, and they are evaluated through the continuous training program.
There was legality, then, but necessity and proportionality?
It is analyzed if it was necessary to use the firearm, if it was proportional to shoot that number of occasions, more than 10 times, as it was done. The expert concludes that in the specific case at hand, it does not meet the criteria of necessity and proportionality.
The court analyzes this and other elements and says that in this case the uniformed officer did not comply with the progressive and rational use of force.
What should be the procedure of the Police then?
The one to apprehend and put at the disposal of the judge.
The policeman Santiago Olmedo says that there was a third person and that, in addition to the knife, they pointed a pistol at him.
The Prosecutor’s Office collects all the videos of the ECU911 and of the commercial premises and homes, to find out if there was a third party that has been talked about and it continues to be said that it is a third party that had threatened the police members. No third party found. The only data where it refers to a third party, in the trial hearing, is the testimony of the sentenced man nowadays. Which it’s was not corroborated.
How do you know he didn’t run away?
It has been said that this third person left for a vacant lot (…) but there are two cameras that they are always capturing the only place through which that third party could escape and Prosecutor does not find that (…) The very police members who appeared in court, who had a first contact with the members involved, said that they were not told of a third party, nor of a firearm.
Did other policemen who arrived also not see the firearm?
One of the police officers moves to the scene. take a picture where we found the two wounded, one on the sidewalk and the other on the cobblestone and the motorcycle in the middle. Underneath the wounded man in the black sweater is a knife and we find a helmet.
Surprise. Minutes later we found a kangaroo (bag) with 9-millimeter bullets (the kind used by the National Police).
Whose was the kangaroo and the bullets?
The Prosecutor’s Office provides in an instruction that the defendants, including the one sentenced today, voluntarily provide us with samples of biological body fluids, to compare them with those of the deceased.
The defendants did not consent to that. But those of the deceased were obtained and we did not find their genetic profiles. What is true is that there is another male genetic profile.
Is this a possible evidence planting?
I am referring to what happened, I will not make qualifications until the moment in which the court rules.
If the sentence is ratified, what guarantees does a police officer who goes to jail have?
There are regulations in the prison system. That will be a matter of analysis at the time. Of course, there would be a risk if he were to serve a custodial sentence. (AVV)
“There is no third party, there is no firearm. They had their backs to each other (the two criminals shot down)”, Patricio Parco, prosecutor in the case.
According to the Prosecutor’s Office, the police they did not present injuries or traces of violence after the fact in which two people were killed.
