The Public Prosecutor’s Office of Navarra has finally decided to appeal against the decision of a Tudela judge to dismiss the case concerning the alleged “sale” of a 14-year-old girl to a family resident in Catalonia in order to marry her to their son. This was confirmed by sources from the Superior Court of Justice of Navarra (TSJN), who underline that the Prosecutor’s Office has appealed against the provisional file of the case, decided by the judge after the minor declared that her stay in Catalonia was voluntary. The case file led to the release of the five detainees in this case. They are the parents of the minor, resident in Navarra, the couple from Mollerussa (Lleida) accused of having “bought” her and their 21-year-old son, with whom she allegedly contracted a forced marriage.
The case became known last Saturday, when the Guardia Civil reported the arrest in Navarra of parents who had “sold” their 14-year-old daughter for 5,000 euros, five bottles of whiskey and food to a couple from Mollerussa. The investigation began in January, when the local police in Corella learned that a couple from the Roma community had sold their 14-year-old daughter to another couple from Mollerussa to marry her. After months, the Mossos observed a minor begging in front of a supermarket in Les Borges Blanques (Lleida). They took her and took her to the police station to investigate whether she was homeless, forced to ask for money or whether she was the victim of a mafia. There they approached those she had referred to as “her uncles,” although officers verified that they had no affiliation details in common with the minor and that there had been a search in the state computer system for the teenager.
Finally, all those present at the police station explained that the minor’s parents had given “a dowry” for Mollerussa’s wedding, consisting of 5 thousand euros, whiskey and food, to the alleged “uncles”, so that she could “voluntarily” marry their son. The Mossos, in fact, know and possess a copy of the recording of the party that was held months before the Roma rite on the occasion of the wedding between the minor and the young 21-year-old, a bond that has no legal validity and of which there is no official trace.
The Catalan police then arrested the Catalan couple and their son, accused of the crimes of child begging, human trafficking and forced marriage, while the General Directorate for Children of the Generalitat took charge of the teenager. The Guardia Civil, for its part, arrested the minor’s parents in Navarra, accused of human trafficking for the purpose of forced marriage. However, after testifying before the Tudela court, the judge ordered the case to be provisionally closed, deeming the minor’s testimony more relevant than the rest of the evidence. The girl stated that she resides voluntarily and with the consent of her parents in Lleida, and denied that her parents forced her to marry and practice begging.
