The public prosecutor of Spain's Supreme Court has backed a bid by one of the worst ETA terrorists to be released from prison early, it was reported on Friday. Henri Parot, an Algeria-born member of the Basque separatist group, was sentenced to 4,799 years of prison for 82 killings and other crimes, but has applied to the court to be released in 2009 after 20 years of his sentence.
20 years? I thought the Euro maximum was 15, less with good behavior. | The Audencia Nacional, Spain's top court, had ruled that Parot should serve two sentences of 30 years each, which would mean he would stay in prison until 2034. The court said two separate sentences were justified for Parot since he committed his crimes in two separate periods of time through different command structures.
However, the Supreme Court public prosecutor agreed with Parot that he has the legal right to see all his sentences accumulated in one 30-year period, stating legal precedents were on Parot's side.
The criminal section of the Supreme Court, which is to rule on Parot's case, though, also has to consider a new charge against him for belonging to a terrorist group. It is alleged that in September 2002, from prison, he was still active in ETA, writing a letter from prison in which he stated to other members that they should "blow up the Bank of Spain, the stock exchanges in Madrid and Barcelona and the head offices of multinational banks". He also asked why the Audencia Nacional had not been blown up. |