He claims that his mind “erased that” and that he did not remember it until a niece told him about it
SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, Oct. 26 (EUROPA PRESS) –
Antonio Martín Marugán, the Renfe controller who had a 100-second telephone conversation with driver Francisco José Garzón just before the derailment of the Alvia train on July 24, 2013, has assured that he did not deny the police having made the call.
“I have no interest in hiding, I did not remember,” he stressed during the fifth day of the trial for the accident, which left 80 dead and 145 injured at the Angrois curve, at the entrance to Santiago de Compostela.
To questions from the prosecutor Mario Piñeiro, the Renfe controller who was traveling on the wrecked train has denied having hidden this information from the police in his first statements to the police. “I did not say it. I forgot. My head, as you will understand, barely 48 hours after being at the scene of the accident…”, he has argued.
In addition, he has highlighted that “at no time” did he refuse to testify, to Piñeiro’s questions about whether they could not locate him. “I was in Coruña all the time, I didn’t go anywhere,” he said.
“I did not remember the call,” he insisted in various interrogations to which he has been subjected as a witness, by lawyers representing the victims of the accident and the parties involved in the tragedy (Adif, Renfe and the insurers, among others).
“I didn’t remember what I was talking about on the phone?”, Lawyer Manuel Alonso Ferrezuelo, from the victims’ platform, criticized him, however, he did remember “many details” of the moment before the derailment. “No, that didn’t exist for me,” replied Martín Marugán.
Before this same lawyer, the auditor has denied that he was recommended not to comment on the telephone call. “No one has told me don’t call me, don’t talk,” he pointed out, to later stress that it was when “a relative” of his told him about her — specifically a niece — when “one day” he remembered . Previously, he has reiterated, “her mind erased that.”
This Tuesday, on the fourth day of the trial, and the first after the declaration of the two defendants –the driver Francisco Garzón and the former Adif security chief, Andrés Cortabitarte–, the national police officer who was in charge of the investigation of the The accident indicated that in the first statements taken after the accident, the Renfe inspector denied the call “twice” moments before the derailment.
In fact, as he answered questions from the Public Prosecutor’s Office and several of the lawyers for the accusations, he commented that “he was not aware” of any of the statements made on said call, but rather that he became aware of it on July 31, a week after the fact, through the telephone record.
