Man acquitted of girlfriend's balcony death confirmed by appeals court

Patricio Reynoso has been definitively acquitted of charges related to the death of his girlfriend, Pilar Riesco, who fell from a fourth-floor balcony in Buenos Aires in March 2020. Reynoso, who was 31 at the time of his indictment, spent time in pretrial detention following the accusation that he had thrown Riesco, then 21, to her death.

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The tribunal a quo attended adequately and according to the rules of rational critical thinking to the various elements that emerged from the debate which, analyzed as a whole, form a picture of doubt such that it prevents reaching the degree of certainty required for the issuance of a conviction.

During the 2022 trial, the prosecutor did not accuse Reynoso of femicide, citing a lack of certainty that he had pushed the young woman. The court ultimately acquitted him, finding insufficient evidence. This decision has now been upheld by a higher court, with the National Criminal and Correctional Cassation Chamber confirming the first-instance sentence.

The appellate judges stated that the lower court had properly considered the evidence presented, which collectively created a level of doubt preventing the certainty required for a conviction. The Public Ministry and the plaintiff had appealed the acquittal, but the higher court rejected their arguments. The judges noted that an appeal based on the context of a violent relationship, rather than concrete proof of the act itself, is constitutionally inadmissible and undermines the justice system.

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What the appellants ultimately try to propose implies a conviction for the context of violence rather than for the proof of the concrete fact. That inversion is not only constitutionally inadmissible, it violates the principle of innocence and due process, but it also does not serve the purposes invoked by the appellants, since convicting someone for the context of a violent relationship without sufficient proof of the concrete fact does not reduce impunity; it displaces it to the field of unjust conviction, which damages the justice system and weakens credibility, trust, and legal certainty. In short, it weakens the Rule of Law.

"The presumption of innocence is not a technicality or a privilege. It is the rule that prevents the state from punishing without certainty," the court's ruling stated. Reynoso's defense highlighted the lasting impact of the accusation and the time spent in detention, emphasizing that the presumption of innocence must be upheld, especially in difficult cases.

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The presumption of innocence is not a technicality or a privilege. It is the rule that prevents the state from punishing without certainty. Upholding it in difficult cases, and not just in comfortable ones, is exactly when it matters.