This April the trial of Daniel Sancho began in Thailand, after last August 2023 he confessed to the murder and dismemberment of the Colombian surgeon Edwin Arrieta. Recently, it has become known that Juan Gonzalo Ospina, a Spanish lawyer who represents Edwin’s family, will testify this coming week as a witness representing the family in the trial.
The Ospina Abogados firm has announced in a statement that the Koh Samui Court, before which Sancho is being tried, has accepted the lawyer’s appearance as a witness, and his statement is expected to be on April 23 or 24. “Juan Gonzalo Ospina will travel to Thailand in the next few hours, where he will remain the necessary days to fulfill the Arrieta family’s assignment and guarantee the correct procedural line of the case in this phase,” reports the statement shared this Sunday.
This news comes just two days after the lawyers of Edwin Arrieta’s family in Thailand presented a request for compensation of 30 million bats (about 760,000 euros) before the Samui court. The Thai co-prosecution lawyers, Mettapon Suwancarern and Lak Wanin, explained to EFE that this is an amount calculated in relation to the economic damage that Arrieta’s death has caused to his parents, who depended on him.
The request, which was already made in the first session of the trial, on April 9, was presented again this Friday with the translated documentation requested by the judge before the deadline for accusations closes next Tuesday. The amount estimated as compensation by the Thai lawyers is almost double the calculation made by the Ospina Abogados firm, which represents the Arrietas in Spain and which estimated it at 410,000 euros (about 16 million bats).
Arrieta’s parents, Ana Marcela Arteaga and Leovaldo José Arrieta, 76 years old and who will not testify, since the judge denied their request to do so by videoconference, received about 900 euros per month for their expenses from their son, and “since his death they have been left in poverty.” That is why they are asking for compensation.
