The Public Prosecutor’s Office of Almeria has requested the dismissal and filing of the case for the death of Iliass T., the 18-year-old boy who died in the ‘Tierras de Oria’ minors’ centre, in Oria, on 1 July 2019, considering that it has not been “duly justified the perpetration of the crime” for which the case was opened.
In a letter sent to the Court of First Instance and Instruction of Purchena (Almería), the Public Prosecutor’s Office recalls that the procedure was initiated by a report from the Civil Guard after the death of the young man, who died after being subjected to a “mechanical restraint”.
The prosecutor compiles the different proceedings carried out at first and specifies that the juvenile centre provided a Mental Health report which reflected the “state of nervousness, aggression and agitation presented by the minor in the moments prior to his death, having activated the suicide prevention protocol”.
He recalls that different members of the centre were called to testify as investigators, including the director for having authorised this manoeuvre.
All of them stated that “the usual practice is to place the child on the supine position (face up), but that in the protocol there are cases in which the child can be placed face down; understanding this case as proportionate to the state of extreme violence of the child and the exhaustion of other ways”.
The autopsy concluded that it was an accidental violent death due to “acute cardiocirculatory failure secondary to cardiac arrhythmia”.
On this point, he reflects that the case was provisionally closed in January 2020 on the understanding that there was no “fault or negligence” on the part of the ten people under investigation at that time, as they did not “overreach” and were not directly responsible for the death, although the dismissal order stated that the restraint in prone position was “contrary to the recommendations”.
She stresses that those involved acted in accordance with the protocol and that their actions would have constituted “in any case” a “slight imprudence that has already been decriminalised”.
However, the prosecutor recalls, the Public Prosecutor’s Office partially supported the private prosecution’s appeal with regard to the investigation of those responsible for the elaboration, approval and application of a protocol that “was not adapted to the various European and national recommendations”.
After this, a statement was taken from the representative of GINSO, responsible for the management of the centre for minors, two members of the advisory committee and the director of ‘Tierras de Oria’.
“We do not appreciate a deliberate non-compliance or ignorance of the regulations; but rather an attempt to adapt to them although due to the long procedure involved in the modification and approval of these reforms; the response may be late, as in this case,” says the prosecutor.
He points out at this point that in 2019 an instruction was approved that “offered greater guarantees” in the application of these containment protocols.
“And currently the protocol has to be modified again” due to a legislative reform that “repeals the possibility of using some means of mechanical restraint; specifically, it has banned the possibility of applying prolonged restraint measures; the minor cannot be restrained to a fixed object, articulated bed or movable objects”.