The National Court investigates whether there is criminal responsibility in the sinking of the 'Villa de Pitanxo'

• The background The shipwrecked fishing boat in Newfoundland had a history of sanctions for illegal fishing

• The facts A "sudden stoppage of the engine" caused the sinking of the 'Villa de Pitanxo'

• Fishing Fishing in Newfoundland, the most dangerous job in the world: 30 below zero, without hours and without a fixed salary

The National Court has opened an investigation to determine whether there is criminal responsibility in the sinking of the Galician fishing vessel

, which sank on February 15, 450 kilometers east of

(Canada).

has advanced

and sources close to the case confirm to Europa Press, the Civil Guard of Pontevedra maintains an investigation that is directed by the Court of Instruction number 1 of the National Court.

The purpose is to elucidate whether there is criminal responsibility in the sinking of the fishing boat based in the port of Marín (Pontevedra), in which nine crew members died, 12 remain missing and there were three survivors.

The information provided by

ensures that the testimony collected by the Armed Institute of crew member Samuel Kwesi contradicts the account of the other two survivors, the boy's employer, Juan Padín, and his nephew

, both residents of the Pontevedra town. of Cangas.

Last Wednesday, the three survivors declared in Vigo before the Commission for the Investigation of Maritime Accidents and Incidents (Ciaim), a body dependent on the Ministry of Transport that they must issue a report on the incident within a maximum period of one year.

The Ciaim investigation

This commission began its investigations after the shipwreck in a first phase in which it formed a team of investigators and collected "documentary and electronic evidence" about the ship, its crew and its voyage.

For this, it compiled certificates of the ship, the construction project, reforms, crew lists, qualifications and certificates of the crew, electronic records of the ship's location systems (blue fishing box and records of the Automatic Identification System), weather forecasts , radio communications and emergency signals.

The Ciaim investigation (independent of the one opened by the National High Court) entered its second phase, which includes interviews with the surviving crew, who arrived in Santiago de Compostela at dawn on February 22 on a flight from Newfoundland.

Family members of the disappeared were also interviewed.

The

group , owner of the

, reported a few days ago that, "according to what was transferred by the skipper", Juan Padín, "the accident occurred during the rigging maneuver".

Based on this account, the fishing vessel sank "very quickly" due to the pounding of the sea that caused it to list after suffering a stoppage in the main engine during a rigging maneuver.

Ship Penalties

The

accumulated several sanctions for serious infractions of illegal fishing, among them, unreported catches of Greenland halibut.

This was announced last Tuesday by

, based on a series of rulings of the National Court, to which Europa Press has had access, the last one dated July 17, 2020.

Specifically, the Ministry of Fisheries sanctioned in 2016 the skipper of the

for six serious infractions of the Maritime Fisheries Law.

The fines totaled more than 160,000 euros for issues such as elimination or concealment of evidence in inspection controls, failure to send vessel positions, not having fishing authorizations and different breaches related to catches on board and displacement.

In addition, 27,778 kilos of Greenland halibut were seized, which were hidden and not recorded in the journal.

The infractions also referred to the shipowner,

, which was imposed a loss of points that boat owners have in the European fishing control regulation due to issues such as the elimination of evidence in control tasks, as well as for the alteration of capture data.

A hidden cellar

The Nores group claimed a communication error between the vessel's personnel, as it maintained that the halibut was not hidden and that "it was the sailor in charge who forgot to remove it," the ruling states.

However, the Contentious-Administrative Chamber of the Court considered the infraction reflected by the inspectors as proven, who "verified the existence of a hidden warehouse where the bagged and unlabelled catches of Greenland halibut were found in a total of 26,788 kilos ".

The appeals presented by the vessel owner were rejected by this judgment of the National High Court, which among other issues defends the appropriateness of imposing the maximum fine of 60,000 euros in one of the sanctions, given that "only because of the actions of the inspectors came to discover the hiding of the halibut in a secret hold, also taking into account the characteristics of the ship and that Greenland halibut is a species subject to special conservation measures".

In another previous judgment of the National Court of 2017, in which the resources of Pesquerías Nores were also dismissed, serious infractions sanctioned by the Ministry in 2014 are collected, as well as that the inspectors attested to an "intentional alteration" of the classification of catches of two rows of Greenland halibut boxes to pass them off as ray catches.

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Know more

• National audience

• Santiago de Compostela

• Pontevedra

• Galicia

• Justice

Tragedy in NewfoundlandA "sudden stop of the engine", cause of the sinking of the 'Villa de Pitanxo'

Tragedy in Newfoundland Solemn return to Spain of the survivors and the bodies of five of those who died in the shipwreck of the 'Villa de Pitanxo'

Courts The maximum operational chief of the Police tells the judge that the Interior did not control the arrival of Ghali in Spain

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