Members of a Panamanian sect they were sentenced to penalties totaling 444 years in prison for killing six children and a pregnant woman with blows and machetes in an indigenous community, one of the country’s risk areas for the proliferation of violent sectarian groups.
“The Trial Court established the maximum sentence of 50 years in prison for each of the seven people (accused)” for the massacre that occurred in the indigenous community of El Terrón on January 14, 2020, the prosecution announced this Friday Panamanian in a statement.
In addition, two other defendants had previously been sentenced to 47 years in prison each, after reaching a sentencing agreement.
According to the prosecution, during the oral trial held in a court in the town of Changuinola, in the province of Bocas del Toro (600 kilometers northwest of the capital), it was possible to prove the guilt of the accused with more than 30 tests.
“A penalty was imposed in accordance with the criminal acts,” said the superior prosecutor Humberto Rodríguez.
According to the accusations, the condemned, belonging to the so-called “La Nueva Luz de Dios” church, tied up their victims and beat them with sticks, Bibles and machetes to “get the devil out of them.”
The events took place during a ritual held in the difficult-to-access community of El Terrón, in the Ngäbe Buglé indigenous region, west of the country.
Six indigenous minors, between the ages of one and 17, as well as a pregnant woman, the mother of five of the children, died as a result of the beatings they received.
The mother, taken by force to the church, was murdered in front of her children, who were later killed in front of everyone present.
The bodies were found – tied up and in an advanced state of decomposition – in a common grave in a cemetery located one hour from the scene.
According to the neighbors, the vegetation, the high walls of the temple and the noise of the rituals prevented the locals from noticing the massacre.
However, several present at the ritual managed to escape wounded and alert the police. Several officers went to the church and detained the members of the sect.
Upon arrival, the condemned were holding 15 other people, including several children, which made the police suspect that they were also going to be euthanized.
Increase of sects
In recent years, there have been several cases in which members of sects have been linked to the murder or kidnapping of people, especially in remote indigenous communities with little presence of the State.
According to the associate researcher of the International Center for Political and Social Studies of Panama (Cieps) Claire Nevache, the withdrawal, mainly of the Catholic Church, has allowed the entry into remote indigenous areas “of many other churches, in which organizations can be filtered. who have bad intentions. “
In August 2020, the Panamanian police arrested in the Ngäbe Buglé region, some 350 kilometers west of Panama City, three alleged members of a sect accused of kidnapping and raping six children.
The leader of this group was arrested a month later by special police forces, who later found human remains in a mass grave located in the area where this sect operated.
The agents needed to walk ten hours through a mountainous area with difficult access to find the grave.
In January 2021, residents of Llano Amador, again in the Ngäbe Buglé region, reported being harassed by another religious sect.
People with the greatest needs “obviously” are “more vulnerable to sectarian drifts, which means that in the most remote territories of the country there is a greater risk of falling into such traps,” Nevache told AFP.
Reference-www.eleconomista.com.mx