Mario Biondo's Parents Seek to Reopen Case with Nullity Appeal

After the statement from the Madrid Provincial Court, which indicated "a complaint against certain individuals, with numerous expert evidence and a copy (...) of a judicial resolution (...) suggesting that Mr. Biondo's death was not a suicide," Mario Biondo's parents, Pippo and Santina, traveled to Barcelona to hold a press conference with lawyer Leire López, legal director at Vosseler Lawyers, to announce the filing of a nullity appeal to reopen their son's case.

Since the death of Raquel Sánchez Silva's husband on May 30, 2013, the parents have rejected the suicide conclusion reached by the Spanish justice system, maintaining it was a crime. With this conviction, the Italian cameraman's father, visibly emotional, stated: "I just want to know who killed my son and why." "This resolution gives us mixed feelings. I see great hope that the truth will finally come to light," he expressed.

Despite the thesis proposed by the Madrid court, which opens the possibility that it was not a suicide, it did not accept the appeal, considering it "res judicata." The Biondos, lamenting that "time has erased the killer's traces," will use this ruling to file a nullity motion.

"This ruling only reaffirms our conviction that Mario Biondo's death was homicidal and probably premeditated, thus murder," stated lawyer Leire López. "There are two errors that we believe we can defend before the Court itself to revoke this request," she added, noting that "no investigation was conducted against anyone in Italy; it was an investigation into someone's death." "This means that because no investigation was conducted against anyone in Italy, many tests were denied in Spain," she pointed out.

"The Provincial Court itself, to support the closure, states that a series of documentary evidence and witness interrogations have already been conducted by the Spanish authorities, but not all the evidence," she emphasized. "We believe the right to effective judicial protection has been violated. Therefore, we understand this closure should be revoked. We want it reopened," López argued.

If the nullity incident does not proceed, the Biondo family plans to file an appeal with the Constitutional Court for violation of effective judicial protection. If the refusal persists, they will appeal to the European Court of Human Rights.

Mario Biondo was found lifeless, hanging from a shelf. At that time, according to Vosseler's lawyer, "no ocular inspection or diligence was carried out." Once the case was concluded as a suicide, the Biondos unsuccessfully attempted to reopen it in Spain, leading them to seek justice in Italy.

There, the Palermo court ruled the existence of "indications" that the death "was not a suicide," prompting the family to file a complaint in Spain to try to reactivate the investigation. In that complaint, they included the "indications" pointed out by the Italian justice, such as a skull hematoma incompatible with suicide. "If Biondo had hit himself due to asphyxiation spasms, they would have had to be so violent that objects would have fallen from the shelf," something that did not happen, supporting the thesis that he was "placed in a position to simulate a suicide," the Biondo's lawyer noted.

Similarly, López recalled that Raquel Sánchez Silva's cousin is an "IT engineer" and "installed software on his computer after his death, connecting to it," which led her to question "why files were deleted from Mario's computer after his death." In this regard, they request tracking of the locations of Mario Biondo's widow's and her cousin's devices. If there are indications of criminality, we believe the test should be conducted. "If they need to be summoned as suspects because they have raised suspicions, it must be done, even if they are not ultimately responsible," López emphasized.

In any case, this complaint has not served to reopen the case, as stated in the Madrid Provincial Court's ruling, but it has served to propose the nullity incident announced by the Biondo family and open a new path to reactivate the investigation.