The Court of Coimbra today sentenced a man to 20 years in prison and his son to 14 and a half years for the crimes of aggravated homicide and desecration of a corpse, in Figueira da Foz in 2022.
The father was sentenced to 19 years in prison for the crime of aggravated homicide and one year and nine months for the crime of desecrating a corpse, a total of 20 years.
Her son, meanwhile, was sentenced to 14 years in prison for the crime of aggravated homicide and one year for the crime of desecrating a corpse, for a total of 14 and a half years in prison.
Since November last year, the Coimbra court has been trying a father and three sons from Figueira da Foz, who were accused of killing a man and hiding his body in 2022, while another son was also accused of omitting to help.
The father and three of his sons were charged with one count of aggravated homicide and one count of desecrating a corpse, while another son was charged with omitting to assist and possession of a prohibited weapon.
During the reading of the judgment, which took place this afternoon, the Coimbra court decided to convict the 64-year-old father and only one of his sons of murder, based on the testimony of two eyewitnesses, who had been heard by teleconference, with a distorted voice and image.
With the testimony of the witnesses with their identities concealed, the court was able to see that the father was supervising the moment when three of his sons assaulted a boy and tried to get him into a large white van.
“One of the sons was identified by an eyewitness, although the other two could not be fully identified,” said the judge, who clarified that the court decided to acquit them, thus terminating their pre-trial detention, because it was not sure of their identity, since the man has six other children.
A stain of the victim’s blood was also found in the 64-year-old man’s van, in a place that is compatible with what the eyewitnesses described.
The father was seen as the mastermind of a “very serious crime”, while the son was seen as his subordinate.
Regarding the motive behind the crime, the Coimbra court was convinced that it happened because the victim “got his hands on” drugs and weapons that didn’t belong to him and thus signed “a kind of death warrant”, which was eventually carried out.
The court also decided to sentence the other son, who was charged with the crime of omitting to help, to two years in prison, which will be converted into 480 hours of community service.
The defendants’ defense lawyer said she will appeal the ruling.
