Lisbon, Oct. 28, 2024 (Lusa) - The defence of former banker Ricardo Salgado opposed the request made by some assistants and victims in the BES/GES trial to appoint a guardian for the former chairman of Banco Espírito Santo, considering it "absurd".
"What would or could this guardian do in this criminal case? Could the guardian, by any chance, make a statement for the defendant at the trial? Could a guardian who didn't experience the events that took place more than 10 or 15 years ago make statements "in the shoes" of the defendant regarding the events that are the subject of this case? The absurdity of the question highlights the absurdity of the solution," reads the response to the requests.
According to the document signed by lawyers Francisco Proença de Carvalho and Adriano Squilacce, published by Correio da Manhã on Monday and to which Lusa had access, the defence also stressed that the proposal to appoint a guardian for Ricardo Salgado does not resolve what it considers to be "the violation of the fundamental right to the personal exercise of defence", given the former banker's clinical situation caused by the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease.
"The absurdity of appointing a guardian would be such that, in the event of the conviction of a defendant with a psychic anomaly, would the Assistants and Victims also understand or acknowledge that it was a guardian who would serve the sentence for the perpetrator of the crime?" added the defence, stressing that this mechanism provided for in the Code of Civil Procedure does not make sense to be applied in this case at the level of criminal proceedings.
According to the lawyers, the presentation of the requests for the appointment of a guardian, despite being "unfounded and without legal reason", "demonstrates that there is a clear awareness on the part of everyone (...) that, given the defendant's current medical condition, he cannot be subject to a criminal trial and that, if this process against the defendant continues in the terms in which the case files are, this trial will be illegal and even null and void".
In the first two sessions of the trial, on 15 and 16 October, several representatives of assistants and victims presented requests to the court to appoint a guardian for Ricardo Salgado due to his medical condition.
The former chairman of BES, Ricardo Salgado, is the main defendant in the BES/GES case and is on trial for 62 offences allegedly committed between 2009 and 2014.
Among the offences charged are one of criminal association, 12 of active corruption in the private sector, 29 of qualified fraud, five of infidelity, one of market manipulation, seven of money laundering and seven of falsifying documents.
In addition to Ricardo Salgado, 17 other defendants are also on trial, namely Amílcar Morais Pires, Manuel Espírito Santo Silva, Isabel Almeida, Machado da Cruz, António Soares, Paulo Ferreira, Pedro Almeida Costa, Cláudia Boal Faria, Nuno Escudeiro, João Martins Pereira, Etienne Cadosch, Michel Creton, Pedro Serra and Pedro Pinto, as well as the companies Rio Forte Investments, Espírito Santo Irmãos, SGPS and Eurofin.
According to the Public Prosecutor's Office, the collapse of GES caused losses of more than €11.8 billion.
JGO/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
