The writer and opponent Ángel Santiesteban Prats denounced that the People's Municipal Tribunal of Diez de Octubre provided the names of the accused and the content of the sentence to the official media Razones de Cuba before the judge finished reading it in court, which he qualified as evidence that the ruling was predetermined from the outset.
"The court that 'judged' us provided our names and sentences to the state-run media. In fact, they knew the verdict before we did. We were still listening to the judge in the courtroom when, in their desperation to assassinate our reputation, our names were already appearing in the official media," Santiesteban Prats wrote on his Facebook profile on Friday.
The court convicted four Cuban Freemasons on Wednesday for alleged illegal currency trafficking: José Ramón Viñas Alonso, former sovereign grand commander of the Supreme Council of the 33rd Degree, received four years of restricted freedom and a fine of 25,000 pesos; Fernando Marcos García, accountant of the National Masonic Asylum "Llansó", was sentenced to three years and 20,000 pesos; and Santiesteban Prats along with Osvaldo Ernesto Villegas Digat received two years of restricted freedom and 20,000 pesos each.
As additional penalties, the four convicted individuals received deprivation of rights, prohibition from leaving the country, and disqualification from holding positions or offices.
The case originated from two currency exchange operations totaling 300 dollars —asylum funds— carried out at the informal market rate: 200 dollars in September 2023 and 100 dollars in June 2025. According to the defense, the first exchange was used to buy powdered milk for the elderly residents, and the second allowed Villegas Digat to purchase medication for his son.
Santiesteban Prats pointed out that the leak to state media shows that the sentence was not a judicial decision but a political order: "This proves that they don't even believe it themselves. Even less so when the sentence had already been anticipated by the henchmen of state security who had warned us."
The writer recounted that a lieutenant colonel from State Security identified as "Kenia" previously offered him the chance to leave the country if he resigned from the position of sovereign grand commander, to which he had been elected just on September 26 with 19 votes. When he refused, the officer warned him that he would be put on trial and sanctioned. "Everything that State Security threatened was fulfilled. They said, either you step down or we’ll remove you," he stated in a video shared by CubaNet.
During the trial, Santiesteban Prats reported irregularities in the process: "I didn’t understand why, after all those hours they had us there, it had not been proven in court that I had committed a crime. The investigator lied; he said things that were not in my statement." He also pointed out the presence of Lieutenant Colonel Kenia and the head of Villa Marista among those attending the tribunal.
The legal organization Cubalex had questioned the legitimacy of the proceedings in an analysis published the day before the trial, pointing out that both transactions were recorded in the accounting books of the asylum —which rules out clandestinity— and that the investigation was assigned to the Specialized Body for Crimes Against State Security of MININT, which is unusual for a currency exchange case. The indictment also included ideological assessments of Santiesteban Prats, including that he "openly expresses opposition to the revolutionary process" and "does not engage in any socially useful activity."
The judge appointed to preside over the trial, Zamira Marrero Morgado, is the same magistrate who in October 2026 sentenced content creator Anna Bensi and her mother to two years of restricted freedom each.
Despite the sentence, Santiesteban Prats concluded with a declaration of firmness: "We never made a deal, we never accepted anything, and I do not put the dignity of the Supreme Council in question or at the mercy of a ruling, nor of pressures, nor of anything." Both the convicted and the prosecutor have the right to file an appeal, which must be resolved by the Provincial People's Court of Havana.
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