Ecuadorian Justice dictates preventive detention for prosecutor killers

Two young people entered detention centers in Ecuador after being linked as suspects in the murder, in broad daylight, of prosecutor Édgar Escobar in the city of Guayaquil, reported the Prosecutor’s Office.

“The judge of Criminal Guarantees accepted the request of the Prosecutor’s Office and ordered preventive detention for Samuel Israel P. Ch., who was given the respective incarceration ticket and transferred to the Litoral Penitentiary,” the entity published in a statement.

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The legal situation of the other detainee, a 16-year-old adolescent with the initials CSDB, was put to the consideration of the juvenile offenders judge, Lilian Ponce, “who, after the prosecutor José Morales Anchundia presented the elements of conviction collected, decided to order preventive internment and transfer to the Center for Adolescent Offenders in Guayaquil,” the Prosecutor’s Office specified.

Both were arrested on September 19 on Santa Ana hill, after a police chase while they were traveling on a motorcycle reported stolen and carrying a firearm.

The request specified that among the elements that implicate them in the events is the statement of a witness, the version of the agents who made the arrest, the motorcycle on which they were traveling and a Taurus brand weapon.

If found guilty, after due process, they could serve prison sentences of 22 to 26 years, for the crime of contract killing.

The 43-year-old prosecutor worked in the Persons and Guarantees Unit of Guayas, and died shortly after the impact he received with a firearm in front of the provincial Prosecutor’s Office building.

Escobar, according to the newspaper El Comercio, had “hot cases” in the Prosecutor’s Office and was currently investigating the attack recorded on August 14 in the Cristo del Consuelo sector, where five people died and another 16 were injured.

After the crime, the president of the Provincial Court of Justice of Guayas, Fabiola Gallardo, asked the Government to declare a state of emergency in the judicial function and that the prosecutors of complex cases can telecommute, until there are conditions for their safety.