The attacker who tried to shoot the former president of Argentina Cristina Kirchner two years ago stated this Wednesday (06/26/2024) during his trial that he did it as “an act of justice.”
“Dr. Kirchner is corrupt, she steals and harms society,” Fernando Sabag Montiel, 37, justified before the court, who on September 1, 2022, fired the trigger centimeters from the then vice president’s head without the weapons coming out. bullets, but unleashing a political earthquake.
The trial focuses on the attacker, his ex-girlfriend and their employer as street vendors, without addressing alleged ideologues or possible financial support, clues that former President Kirchner demanded to investigate and that are part of a parallel case.
“The idea was to kill Cristina,” said Sabag when claiming responsibility for the attack in the first hearing of the trial, in which the charges against the defendants for attempted aggravated homicide were read, a crime that carries penalties of up to 25 years.
The hearing, which lasted seven hours, ended on Wednesday afternoon and the second will take place next week.
The 6th Federal Court of Appeals read the accusations of the plaintiff and the prosecution, which cited text messages exchanged by the accused.
In them, he realized that the accused provided themselves with an illegal weapon, the one used in the attack, tried to rent a home near the former president’s house and looked for an opportunity to execute her.
“They were fully aware of what they were doing and its possible consequences,” the complaint said.
Kirchner will testify at the trial
Throughout the hearings that will be held on a weekly basis, some 300 witnesses will be heard, including Kirchner herself, in a process that is estimated to last for a year.
The aggressor turned out to be a candy seller who that night attacked Kirchner in front of her house in Buenos Aires, mixed among hundreds of supporters who came to support her when she was being tried for alleged fraud during her presidency (2007-2015).
Sabag Montiel pulled the trigger twice without the bullets coming out and was arrested right there. At the trial he appeared calm and willing to elaborate on his answers, in which he defined himself as “apolitical” and “Christian.”
“Despite having wanted to kill a person, without being hypocritical, I am a Christian,” he told the court.
Asked about the motivations that led him to plan and execute the attack, he responded that “the purposes have more of a personal tinge than an aim that could benefit a political sector.”
His girlfriend at the time, Brenda Uliarte, who accompanied him to the vicinity of the scene, was arrested days later, as was Nicolás Carrizo, their employer as candy sellers and identified as a “planner.”
Sabag Montiel, a bearer of tattoos with philo-Nazi symbols, showed a “narcissistic” personality and an “extravagant” speech, according to experts.
Uliarte is accused of being a “co-author” and accused of being an instigator, while Carrizo is accused of complicity.
mg (afp, clarion)
In depth – Cristina Kirchner: justice or conspiracy?
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