The lawsuit representing the victims of a sect, accused of sexually and labor exploiting dozens of people in a downtown hotel in the city of Mar del Plata, requested this Monday the confiscation of all his assets and that they be disposed of reparations of between 35 and 61 million pesos for material and moral damages caused to some of them.
The request was made by the representative of the Public Defender of the Victim (DPV), Ines Jaureguiberryand the official from the Public Ministry of Defense, Manuela Parrawhen presenting his closing argument before the Federal Criminal Oral Court (TOF) of the seaside resort, within the framework of the trial that is being carried out against three defendants who were part of the organization.
For the DPV, throughout the oral debate, which began in September 2021, it was proven that “a criminal organization with traces of a religious sect” was operating under “the façade” of an institute dedicated to teaching yoga, with “distribution of roles” and a “hierarchical” structure, which for almost five decades was dedicated to “capturing vulnerable victims” to seize their property and exploit them sexually and for labor.
On behalf of five of the victims, the lawsuit requested that the court establish comprehensive reparations for each of them, which They range from 35,496,480 pesos to 61,641,200for the material damage suffered, such as the labor, sexual and psychological exploitationand the moral damages because of the “tortures and insultssuffered, in some cases for decades.
In order to comply with these reparations, the magistrates were asked Fernando Machado Pelloni, Nicolas Toselli and Roberto Falcone that, when dictating sentence in the trial, order the confiscation of the goods in the name of the different members of the sect.
According to what they indicated, among these possessions is the building of the Hotel Citylocated on Diagonal Alberdi at 2600, in the heart of Mar del Plata, where the organization worked until it was dismantled in July 2018.
In addition, they included two apartments located in the City of Buenos Aires, bank accounts in Argentina and abroad, cash seized in the framework of the raids on the organization’s headquarters, a car and two motorhomes.
Jaureguiberry stressed that the request for reparation does not point to any of the accused specifically, but to the assets “that are the product of exploitation” deployed by the sect, “regardless of whose name they are in.”
In the trial developed in the Mar del Plata TOF they are accused Silvia Cristina Capossiello, Sinecio de Jesús Coronado Acurero and Luis Antonio Fanesiwho are serving preventive detention and followed the hearing remotely from Federal Complex 1 and Unit 31, in Ezeiza.
The three are accused of integrating “a criminal organization” whose “structure was used to commit crimes”, both in Venezuela and Argentina, from the early 1970s until its dismantling, and the prosecution asked a week ago that they be sentenced to sentences of between 17 and 40 years in prison.
For the DPV, it was proven that within the framework of the operation of the sect “there were births”many of them the product of sexual abuse, and “alteration of identities”.
In addition, it was detailed that “the victims contributed goods and money to the organization”and later they suffered “isolation from the outside world”, “interruption of ties with relatives and affections”, “lack of formal education” in the case of minors and “constant surveillance”, and those who escaped were “demonized”.
Public Defender of the Victim, throughout the oral debate, which began in September 2021, it was proven that under “the facade” of an institute dedicated to teaching yoga” “a criminal organization with traces of a religious sect” operated, with “role distribution” and a “hierarchical” structure
Based on the testimonies given by the victims in the trial, Jaureguiberry pointed out that the organization established a “system of control and torture”, that its members were “specialists in beatings”, and that they also stored “a large number of weapons”. .
According to the allegation made in the preliminary hearing by the prosecution, Capossiello -partner of Eduardo Nicosia, leader and founder of the sect who died in January 2021- was accused as co-author of the crime of “human trafficking for the purpose of sexual and labor exploitation” to the detriment of ten victims.
She was also accused of being a necessary participant in the “aggravated sexual abuse” suffered by three members from Nicosia, two of them his own daughters, and the prosecution requested in his case a sentence of 40 years in prison.
According to the indictment, by the prosecutor Fabian Celiz and the helper Carlos FiorettiCoronado Acurero and Fanesi are also guilty of the crime of trafficking, but as primary participants.
In the case of Coronado Acurero, considered the “right hand” of the head of the sect, the requested sentence was 27 years in prison, while for Fanesi it was 17.
The prosecution had also asked the court for compensation of 6,600,000 pesos for each of the victims, for the “moral damage” suffered.
In the case of the DPV, to assess the damage and consider the amounts of the reparations, it had an opinion from the Program for Advice and Promotion of the Rights of Victims of the Crime of Trafficking in Persons of the Office of the General Ombudsman of the Nation, coordinated by Marcela Rodriguez.
This ruling took into account “non-pecuniary damage, damage to the life project, injury to the right to identity, psychological damage, consequential damage, and damage from sexual violence.”
The trial will continue next Monday, with the argument of the defense of the accused.
At the beginning of this process, the psychologist Fernando Ezequiel Velázquez was also listed as a defendant, but he died weeks ago, while serving preventive detention.
