Manuel De Almeida / Lusa
Ricardo Salgado (L), former president of BES, outside the Central Criminal Investigation Court
With resources close to being exhausted and experts indicating that Salgado has advanced dementia, it is likely that the former banker will not serve an effective prison sentence.
With the imminent exhaustion of appeals against the convictions imposed on Ricardo Salgado, the Portuguese courts will soon have to decide how to execute the sentences imposed on the former president of Banco Espírito Santo.
According to one of the most recent medico-legal examinations, Ricardo Salgado suffers from advanced Alzheimer’s disease, with disorientation in time and space, severe memory difficulties and an inability to perform simple tasks, such as counting change or knowing his own name.
Salty was sentenced to a sentence of eight years in prison for having appropriated more than 10 million euros from BES, to which is added another sentence of just over six years in the EDP case. Both processes are in the final stage at the Constitutional Court and should soon return to the first instance for execution of the sentences, according to the .
Under normal circumstances, the decision would involve the issuance of an arrest warrant to serve an arrest warrant. However, the Supreme Court of Justice itself has already admitted, in previous decisions, that the execution of the sentence could prove to be “unjustifiable and inhumane” if it is demonstrated that the condemned person is unable to understand the punishment imposed on him.
Experts in criminal law emphasize that Portuguese legislation is silent regarding the procedural treatment of defendants who are definitively incapable. Jurist Pedro Castelo Branco argues that judging or punishing someone without the capacity to defend themselves violates constitutional principles and the European Convention on Human Rights by “denying the essential core of these guarantees and impeding the implementation of a fair and equitable process”.
Other scholars recognize the dilemma between humanitarian principles and the need to preserve the credibility of justice. Among the possible solutions are the hospitalization in an appropriate health institutionmandatory stay in housing or suspension of sentence with electronic surveillance.
The final decision will now rest with the judges, who will now have to find a solution capable of balancing the protection of the defendant’s rights with the demands of justice.
