Natividad Jáuregui, transferred by police in November 2020 after being handed over by the Belgian authorities. HANDOUT FROM THE SPANISH NATIONAL POLICE (EFE)
ETA member Natividad Jáuregui, known by the aliases Jaione and Pepona, was released. The National Court ordered his release this Thursday after considering the statute of limitations for the crimes attributed to him for the attack on Lieutenant Colonel Ramón Romeo, murdered by the terrorist group in 1981 with a shot in the back of the head. Since Belgian authorities arrested her in November 2020 and extradited her to Spain after nearly four decades on the run, Jáuregui has spent three years in preventive detention awaiting trial for the crime. An oral hearing that, as the court decided, should not take place.
With a decision on Thursday, the criminal chamber gave a decisive turn to the ongoing legal proceedings against Jáuregui. Contrary to the prosecutor’s criteria, the court argues that ETA’s criminal responsibility for the murder of the lieutenant colonel expired 20 years after the attack, since the investigation was not directed against it during this entire period. And for this reason, the judges agreed to try the case and ordered his release with precautionary measures: since he is still on appeal at the Supreme Court, he is obliged to appear in court once a month and is forbidden to leave the country The country and his passport were confiscated.
Pepona was the last ETA member remaining in prisons outside the Basque Country and Navarre. The six-year-old, whose involvement in the murder of Ramón Romeo was proven by a Spanish court, was held in the Alcalá Meco penitentiary (Madrid). According to his defense, he has already been released from prison.
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Since the surrender of Jáuregui by Belgium, the prescription of crimes has hovered over this case. The defense has raised this fact several times, but only found a positive answer this Thursday when the criminal court agreed to it. The judges now conclude that the trial was only directed against Jáuregui in December 2005, as the attack was committed in 1981, when an indictment was issued. And at that point, the legally stipulated 20 years for the prescription had already expired.
At this point, the court expresses some criticism of the investigation, pointing out that suspicions of Jáuregui’s involvement had existed since 1987, when one of her companions (Enrique Letona) implicated her in the crime during a statement at police headquarters. However, no action was taken against them. In their decision on Thursday, the judges emphasized a “lack of judicial will to investigate, which surprises the chamber at this point in time.”
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Counterterrorism forces emphasize that Jáuregui was a member of the Vizcaya commando in the 1980s. After the verdict of the National Court that convicted three of his companions – Enrique Letona, Sebastián Echániz and José Antonio Borde – for the murder of Ramón Romeo, Pepona participated in the crime and was responsible for shooting the lieutenant in the back. He went to die Listening to Mass in the Basilica of Our Lady of Begoña in Bilbao. She denies it.
Jaione was born in San Sebastián in 1958 and remained a target of the police for a long time. According to the Interior Ministry, he first fled to France in 1978 after being linked to the Iskulin commando. But after a while he decided to return and joined the Vizcaya command. As a member of this group, he is said to have carried out several attacks before returning to the French countryside, from where he moved to Mexico. He was located there in 2002, but disappeared again. “[Entonces]“She secretly returned to Europe and settled in Belgium, where she was arrested in the city of Ghent in 2013,” the security forces stressed.
Belgian authorities
The National Court then promoted the process of handing over Jáuregui, but ran afoul of the Belgian authorities. Despite issuing two international arrest warrants, that country’s courts refused to extradite her on the grounds that Spain could violate the ETA member’s fundamental rights and released her. In 2017, the military man’s family finally appealed to Strasbourg, which condemned Belgium, thereby reactivating the surrender that would culminate in November 2020.
Jáuregui’s life in Belgium sparked particular outrage among ETA victims for years. Until his extradition, Ramón Romeo’s family complained that the ETA member, who had settled in Ghent, had spent her days “like a queen” while she was “a murderer through and through.” Pepona had worked in restaurants, contributed to a cookbook, opened her own restaurant and lived “without hiding,” according to Belgian public broadcaster RTBF. When she was arrested in 2013, her social media profile was filled with dozens of haute cuisine dishes and recipes.
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