Second jailed ETA member freed after Strasbourg ruling

Jailed ETA member Juan Manuel Píriz left Algeciras prison in the south of Spain on Friday just three hours after the High Court ordered his release. He became the second Basque terrorist to be freed after the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) struck down the so-called “Parot doctrine,” a method Spanish courts used to keep terrorists and other violent criminals in jail for the maximum time allowed.

Píriz had spent 29 years and eight months in jail, just four short of the maximum term in Spain. He had been sentenced to 61 years and two days in jail for belonging to a terrorist organization, illegal possession of arms and for the murder in 1984 of former ETA militant Mikel Solaun Angulo, whom he shot to death in front of his wife and his children.

Before the Parot doctrine came into effect in 2006, Píriz would have been eligible for release in 2009. The doctrine called for time off from sentences for good behavior and for working or studying to be deducted from the entire jail sentence, not the maximum of 30 years that was in effect when Píriz was convicted, effectively ensuring that the full three decades would be served. In a ruling released Monday, the ECHR argued that sentencing could not be changed retroactively and that the Spanish authorities were illegally detaining prisoners already due for release. The Strasbourg court also ruled that the doctrine infringed the Spanish Constitution.

The first ETA member to be released this week was Inés del Río, whose case the ECHR ruled on. She was sentencing to 3,828 years and one day of jail on 23 counts of murder, including the bomb attack against a bus full of civil guards in Madrid in July 1986, killing 12.

Píriz should have been eligible for release in 2009

The Spanish government has told Strasbourg that a total of 93 ETA prisoners are eligible to have their sentences reviewed, with 51 already requesting this. Another 37 convicted criminals, including murderers, rapists and pedophiles also have had their sentences prolonged under the Parot doctrine.

Multiple rapist Antonio García Carbonell on Thursday was the first common criminal released after the ECHR’s decision. He had served 18 years in jail after originally being condemned to 200 years.

The High Court session on Friday put off making a decision on a sentence review petition filed by ETA prisoner Josefa Ernaga until November 8. Even after the Strasbourg ruling, Ernaga would not be eligible for release until December 2014. As of next November 8, the High Court will hold a weekly session to study petitions for sentence reviews lodged by ETA members on a case-by-case basis. The exception to this is prisoners who have appealed to the Supreme Court or the Constitutional Court.