Mother of protesters detained in Caimanera denounces police violence: The oldest had two of his teeth knocked out

The mother of two brothers detained after the Caimanera protests denounced the police violence to which the young people are subjected in the Provincial Criminal Investigations and Operations Unit, in Guantánamo, where they remain held.

"The first times I went to visit them I realized that my son Luis Miguel was hiding his face and later I knew it was because the blows had knocked out two of his teeth, I could hardly recognize him because he was so bad," he told the independent media.14 SeptemberVictoria Martinez, mother ofLuis Miguel Alarcón Martínez, 32 years old, andFelipe Octavio Correa Martínez, 26.

His testimony includes a series of acts of police brutality against his children, due to which one of them lost his teeth and they are in terrible physical condition.

On one occasion, she said, Felipe Correa received her trembling during a visit and extremely thin, "down to the bone."

Young people are also victims of other violations, since they have not had all the guarantees for their criminal process.

"I have already had to hire two lawyers, I paid 4,200 pesos for each one and that was very difficult for my family because we are low-income people. But the lawyers have not even been able to talk to my children," he denounced.

One of the lawyers, he said, only answered that "they were already on board" after showing the lawyer the videos of the protest showing that the brothers did not commit acts of violence.

"When I went to see the police instructor in the case, who is First Lieutenant Dailovis Torres, he gave me a paper that says that they are being prosecuted for public disorder and Felipe Octavio is also told that he is being prosecuted for resistance," the mother reproached. that he does not understand why the case files are in the Military Prosecutor's Office, as the police officer told him, if they are civilians.

The family also does not know the date for the trial or details of what will happen to them: "They don't tell us anything, they just drag us off, they want to entertain us."

While the process continues to be overshadowed by the authorities who seek to fabricate crimes for the young protesters, activists and journalists denounce that State Security continues to harass and intimidate them to change their versions about the protests.

The reporter ofPalenque Vision and opponent Yeris Curbelo Aguileraexpressed in a video broadcast by the independent mediaCubanet that after the last visit, Victoria Martínez told him that after 21 days of confinement in the police unit, the minor cannot stand because the food is meager and in poor condition.

He also condemned that after interviewing the relatives of the detainees and denouncing the violations, the regime tries in every way to get them to change their testimonies, alleging that they received a lot of money to tell another version.

"They are weaving a web to discredit me as an independent journalist because I have been covering the protests and what is happening against these young people in Guantánamo," Curbelo said.

When remembering the events of May 6 in Caimanera, Victoria Martínez referred to14 Septemberthat "they beat them as if they were animals."

"They dragged my son for three blocks. His brother approached to find out what they were doing to his brother and they beat him too. Since that day they have been in prison," he said.

The eldest is married, and is responsible for his wife's son and two nephews, one of whom suffered a stroke.

The situation at the mother's house is also critical, the woman takes care of a sister with a disability and "the arrest of my children has made my day-to-day life more complicated."

"I don't even want to eat, I can't sleep, I have no life since that day they took them," he said.

The two Guantanamo residents are part of the group offive arrested in protestsunleashed at the beginning of May, when hundreds of residents of Caimanera took to the streets to demand food and freedoms, after several families had gone without food for several days, and were repressed by regime forces.

Yandris Pelier Matos, the brothers Felipe Correa Martínez and Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez, and the brothersRody and Daniel Álvarez González They were violently arrested for participating in the demonstrations.

Cuban civil society initiated acampaign to demand the release of the five, in which they asked to publish the names and faces of those detained in Caimanera.