Ana María Gutiérrez, a resident of Laredo and victim of sexist violence, will see her attacker leave jail next Saturday, a situation in which she has acknowledged feeling “very afraid”, “insecurity” and “impotence”. “I don’t want to be just another one, a flag at half-staff or a notice in the newspaper,” she said.
Although he has assured that “he will try to continue living and continue fighting”, “he does not know how, nor what will happen to him”. “I will have to turn around every moment to know what I have behind my back,” she explained this Sunday during her attendance at the third concentration organized by the Gaia Feminist Space to give her support, an appointment they have attended in around a hundred people.
With this gesture, Laredo has wanted to accompany the struggle of this woman, who after having survived sexist violence must now face the release of her aggressor from prison, sentenced for her case to 5 years and 11 months, without protective measures and with technical reports that warn that a reinsertion process has not taken place.
The victim has thanked the organizing group of these concentrations and those who have supported them for this support and has assured that it gives her “strength” to “know that she is not alone in this fight”. “I want to live and if it can be free and without fear, the better,” she has said.
Despite this support, he has denounced that “it is not supported by the Justice”. “That’s the problem,” said Ana María, who explained that there is a report from the Dueso prison, in Santoña, which indicates that her aggressor “has not reinserted himself, he is dangerous” and a “possible repeat offender.” “How are you going to feel, with a fear that you cannot live with. You try to lead a normal life, but it is impossible”, she has recognized.
Ana María believes that there should be more support for people like her and has warned that the release of the aggressor from prison not only influences her or her family, but the whole of society.
And it is that he has pointed out that every day in the news there are cases of convicts who leave prison and do the same thing again. “I think it’s time to change the laws to do something with these people,” she said.
In his opinion, if these people “are not here to be among normal people”, “there would have to be some place to have them or find a way to reinsert them”. “I am not asking that they be locked up for life, but rather that they do something to reinsert them and live well,” she clarified.
Ana María has recalled that there are “many women” who suffer from sexist violence “but they do not say so and hide it” and has claimed that it is necessary to “go out into the street” to denounce it.
He has hoped that one day sexist violence would end, but he believes that first, to achieve it, they will have to “change many laws.” “That is a thing of very powerful people and it is not in our hands but we have to keep fighting so that one day that day will come,” he has said.
The rally in support of Ana María was held near the Casa de Cultura Doctor Velasco and included different protest actions or gestures, such as the performance of a song against sexist violence, the reading of a manifesto by the organizers, or the placement by each of the attendees of messages on a mural that said: ‘I promise not to look the other way’.
On the balcony of the House of Culture, the organizers have also placed a banner with the slogan ‘Not one less’, which has also been chanted at the concentration.
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