Despite the house arrest, Justice complicated the pediatrician accused of pedophilia for the photos of girls he took in the Garrahan

After his detention last May by the City Police, pediatrician Ricardo Russo first was locked in a room of the prison hospital of Ezeiza, monitored 24 hours, isolated from other detainees. "I don't know how this guy is going to endure jail. But not what he has now, jail seriously", asked a source close to his confinement. Then, Russo went to a cell.

Now, with an electronic ankle brace attached to his leg, He will return home.

After an appeal filed by his defense, the Swing III of the criminal offense and offenses by the judges Sergio Delgado and Elizabeth Marum decided that The former head of the immunology and rheumatology department of the Garrahan hospital accused of possession and production of child pornography receives the benefit of house arrest.

He would return, according to judicial sources, to his home in Núñez, the same one that Gendarmería Nacional raided in November 2018 to find devices containing images of minors. A Gendarmerie expert assessed the kidnapped devices at the scene: there were 761 photos and two videos with girls and boys aged 6 to 12 years. Then we found photos dating from noon on November 24, 2015, 9 in total, taken in the Garrahan with an iPhone 6 where two girls are seen, from 6 to 9 years old, which show their vaginas. Then, the experts found 39 photos of January of the same year taken on the beach with a digital camera, girls were seen in them too. A search of his computer in his office also revealed prohibited material.

Russo's defense in his appeal, Judge Delgado reasoned in the ruling, disputed several points, including the alleged distribution of pedophile sexual content. The defense also scored the alleged contradiction of keeping Russo locked up, citing cases of criminals with crimes of major penalties that were releasedHe recalled that the pediatrician has no previous convictions, that he did not resist when they were arrested in the Garrahan parking lot and that He even offered assets as a security.

There is a hypothesis in the file: that Russo would have tried to intimidate witnesses, with a contact to a medical colleague in the Garrahan through a third party and calls to the mothers of the girls that can be seen in the images. Judge Delgado does not consider this. He stated in his vote that the call to the doctor in the Garrahan does not consist of intimidation and that the contacts to the mothers they were in charge of the former pediatrician defense lawyer.

A] Yes, Delgado voted for house arrest with an ankle brace until the start of the trial against him.

Judge Marum, however, he complicated the pediatrician, the strongest argument in the entire decision of Room III. Marum recalled that Russo's lawyer disputed that the images taken in the Garrahan were made for the purpose of sexual abuse and enjoyment. At the pretrial hearing a seized image was displayed to the doctor where a girl dressed in costumes and bijouterie is seen, in sensual poses. These images, the defense argued, are very different from those produced by the doctor. The photos taken at the hospital were, according to the defense, by strictly professional, clinical reasons, something that Russo assured in the extension of his investigation. Regarding the photos of girls on the beach They could have been taken by anyone else.

Marum didn't see it this way. He wrote a lapidary paragraph in his vote. In the photos of the Garrahan, he said, You don't see anything that looks like a disease.

"At this point it must be said that the arguments put forward by the accused and his defense, regarding the fact that the taking of these images had exclusively medical purposes, they cannot be seen in this instance of the process, since none of them can be observed, at least with the naked eye, a medical pathology that justifies the taking of these images, and that from the testimonies of the doctors collected within the framework of this research, It appears that the mode of taking pictures of young girls, running their underwear is not, in any way, usual, or recommended, but it must be the mother or herself who does it, "said the judge.

Thus, with the degree of certainty that corresponds to the stage of the process, Marum reasoned that "Ricardo Alberto Guillermo Russo produced images of the genital parts of young girls, predominantly sexual purposes."

Daniela Dupuy, the prosecutor who investigated the case and took Russo to jail, awaits the resolution of the start of the oral trial. Meanwhile, shortly after 22 Friday, the Federal Penitentiary Service received the judicial office with the request to transfer to the doctor.