Alicante 7th Criminal Court acquitted four defendants in connection with a robbery that targeted a woman who sustained injuries during the incident in 2017. The heist involved the theft of more than 36,000 euros from a collection spanning three businesses located in the Plaza Mar 2 shopping center in Alicante. Two of the defendants were cleared, while one defense attorney named was José Luis Sánchez Calvo. The defendants were linked to an employer from which the victim had been collecting recovery money. The court’s decision held that the offenses could not be proven against the four individuals. They faced potential prison terms of four years, and three years and six months, for participating or aiding in the planning and execution of the robbery.
Material responsibility was attributed to the brother of one of the acquitted employees, whose whereabouts remained unknown; Sánchez Calvo had previously represented him.
The facts established by the sentence unfolded shortly before noon on July 28, 2017, at Plaza Alicante 2 March. The victim, coordinating the collection from three commercial premises, carried 36,774 euros in two bags and was heading to the upper floor toward the mall’s parking area. A man, concealing his face with a scarf, approached from behind and assaulted the victim, wresting the two bags containing the money and fleeing. The victim sustained minor scratches in the course of the struggle.
According to the judge of Criminal Court No. 7 of Alicante, the evidence presented did not suffice to prove the defendants’ participation or collaboration in the robbery. At trial, both the prosecutor and the special prosecutor had argued that two employees knew the victim would visit the store to collect money that day, and that the brother of one of these workers was alleged to be the individual who carried out the theft. The ruling emphasizes there was no direct evidence linking the defendants to the crime and notes that the person regarded as the thief remained at large. The reporting judge underscored that the suspect’s whereabouts were unknown, he had never declared himself under investigation, and the investigating judge had not even declared him in absentia. As a result, the court cautioned that concluding the employee’s brother was the author would amount to smuggling and would not meet the standard of proof required in criminal proceedings.
The victim had previously testified to the police that she could identify the attacker’s face on August 5, but she did not make that identification at the time of the attack. The woman did recognize the brother of the acquitted employee from photographs shown at the police station; however, the judge stated that such recognition did not constitute admissible evidence because it did not occur on the stand in court or at a hearing.
[Citation: Alicante Court records]