Argentina convicts former Army lieutenant for crimes against humanity committed during dictatorship

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A Buenos Aires court sentenced this Tuesday (02) to six years in prison former Army first lieutenant Ricardo Alberto Pascual as co-perpetrator of the crimes of illegal deprivation of liberty and torture in the clandestine detention center known as Sheraton during the last Argentine military dictatorship (1976-1983).

Composed of Judges Adrián Grünberg, José Antonio Michilini, and Ricardo Basílico, the Oral Court in Federal Criminal 1 sentenced the former military officer for the crimes of aggravated illegal deprivation of freedom and torture against María de la Mercedes Victoria Joloidovsky and acquitted him for the same crimes against Héctor Daniel Klosowski, who is still missing.

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Within the framework of the de facto regime – in which, according to human rights organizations, some 30,000 people were kidnapped and made to disappear – the Sheraton operated, at least between October 1976 and October 1978, in the Villa Insuperable sub-commissariat, in the Buenos Aires locality of La Matanza, under the control of Artillery Group 1, where Pascual held the position of Personnel Officer and Assistant.

This is the third stage of the trial that judges the crimes against humanity perpetrated in that clandestine detention center.

In 2019, the court sentenced four former military personnel and two former police officers to prison terms of up to 25 years for the kidnapping of 18 people, the torture inflicted on eight of them, and a double homicide.