Case reopened to investigate police actions and digital violence against a gay couple in Buenos Aires
The courts have reopened an investigation into the online harassment of a gay couple who were physically assaulted in September 2020 in Buenos Aires. The police response will also be investigated.
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By Rosario Marina
Illustration: Florencia Capella
The courts have reopened an investigation into the online harassment of a gay couple who were physically assaulted in September 2020 in Buenos Aires . The new development is that the police actions on the day of the attack will also be investigated. “I’m very happy, because I feel less like a victim, less like a second-class citizen,” P., one of the victims, told Presentes .
Pedro Paradiso Sotille, president of the Equality Foundation and executive director of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association for Latin America and the Caribbean (ILGALAC), considered this reopening as “crucial, at least to begin to put an end to this history of impunity, silence and invisibility of the issue.”.
A chain of violence
On September 30, 2020, P. and her boyfriend Y. were walking home after having a beer. They stopped at the corner of Aráoz and 1900, in the Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires, and kissed. They heard screams, and a few seconds later, blows began. In addition to the beating they received that night, the couple reported two other incidents: homophobic messages on social media and attacks at their front door.
On March 30 of this year, P. learned that the prosecutor had closed the investigation. The assailants hadn't been found, and the street security cameras weren't working. The investigation into those events was shelved. But he decided to file a motion with the prosecutor's office of the Western Court of Appeals in Buenos Aires.
“I am appearing to exercise my right to be heard and to express my disagreement with the results of the investigation, as it is my intention not to condone the cycle of violence that my partner and I have endured since kissing in public, acts which have gone unpunished.” Among the abuses she suffered, she listed physical violence, but also institutional violence from the police and violence received on social media.
Investigate the police
Days after the legal presentation, the prosecutor of the Chamber, Sergio Martín Lapadu, responded: “I will have to reopen the investigation so that the merit instance can take action on the possible commission of public action crimes in the actions carried out by the acting police personnel (…) both on the day of the event and on the occasion of being at the place of its commission (September 30, 2020 at approximately 10:00 p.m., on Aráoz Street at 1900 in this City) as well as their actions at the police station.”.
In his statement, P. said that on the day of the attack, they received “the refusal of 2 police officers to apprehend and identify the aggressors who were stalking us in the area, after the attack. Under the pretext that we had to identify them - to which we responded that we would accompany them and identify them - they claimed that we had to first file a report at the police station.”.
Later, when they went to the 14A police station in the City of P., he said that his partner was denied immediate medical attention, and that, when filing the complaint, he had to ask several times for the correction of the report, because the perspective of our story was constantly changing and the real motive for the hate attack and the fact that we are a gay male couple were omitted—which had to be repeated, explained and reinforced on multiple occasions for the officer to understand it and record it—constituting an obstacle to the filing of our complaint.
The prosecutor also asked the PCyF Prosecutor's Office No. 22, headed by Paola de Minicis, who had decided to archive all points of the case, to issue a letter to the Office of Transparency and External Control of the City Police, a decentralized body of the Ministry of Justice and Security of the City of Buenos Aires, to "notify them about the conduct that will be investigated and the effects they deem pertinent.".
Facebook is being asked to identify cyberbullies
The closed case wasn't just about the attack that night; it also investigated the online harassment P. and Y. suffered after the news broke in the media. Some of the messages they received said: “Long live HIV,” “They got their asses kicked,” “AIDS patients,” “They'll get caught again and they won't live to tell the tale,” “Minorities adapt to the majority, not the other way around! And if you don't understand it the easy way, you'll have to understand it the hard way!” “The good thing is we know where you live, it's just a matter of coming to find you!”.
The prosecutor also addressed this point, requesting that Facebook Inc. be asked again to provide data on two Instagram users who posted those comments. The data he requested includes information from the Transactional Information Log, the IP address log (including all IP addresses used for account creation and access up to the present day, with relevant dates and times), registered user information, and information on any password changes.
The prosecutor also requested action be taken on a profile named Matías, "for which a plan of tasks must be drawn up with the computer operators, to establish how the field of technology could help to find the correct identification.".
“I think it’s important that the Justice system has to exhaust all avenues of investigation and that the State has to make so many statements and reinforce LGBT rights so much,” P told Presentes.
A paradigm shift in the justice system?
Days before this reopening, the court acquitted Mariana Gómez of the charges of minor injuries and contempt of authority, for which she was convicted in 2019. The ruling acknowledges the lesbophobic discrimination by the police and the judiciary. In both cases, the focus is on police actions in relation to members of the LGBTQ+ community.
“These are two separate cases that demonstrate a shift in stance, a paradigm shift, which is being reaffirmed within an institutional and social transformation,” Sottile explained to Presentes . Although he doesn't see it as a widespread issue within the Buenos Aires justice system and believes there is still much to be done, he considers them significant achievements for a justice system “that is beginning to dismantle its patriarchy, its homophobia, lesbophobia, and its sexist, patriarchal, and systemic perspective.”
For P., this change taking place in the justice system is the result of struggles and social pressure. Sotille agrees on the importance of organizations, and explains that even if it is through second or final instances of review, it is important to begin breaking down this paradigm of hatred, discrimination, stigma, and complicity.
For all these reasons, she emphasizes the need for a feminist, diverse, and cross-cutting judicial reform. And she concludes: “We are on that pivotal path.”.
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