The Supreme Court's majority ruling
The Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation rejected the defense appeal and left standing the ten-year prison sentence for Pedro Müller, former manufacturing manager at Ford Motor Argentina. The 2018 ruling by Federal Criminal Oral Court No. 1 of San Martín had found him a necessary participant in aggravated unlawful deprivation of liberty and aggravated torture suffered by 24 workers at the automaker during the last civic-military dictatorship. The court had ordered that Müller not be detained until the decision became final.[S1][S2]
The resolution was carried by Justice Horacio Rosatti and associate justices Fernando Poviña of Tucumán and Juan Ignacio Pérez Curci of Mendoza. They dismissed the appellant's grievances, holding that he insisted on challenging his responsibility based solely on the position he held, without rebutting the evidence that established his determining role and effective control within the plant. The majority said the defense failed to counter proof of his special relevance among Ford authorities and his effective control of the facility where the crimes occurred.[S1][S2]
Rosenkrantz's dissent and the benefit of the doubt
Justice Carlos Rosenkrantz voted in dissent to grant the defense appeal and overturn the conviction. He argued that during the period of the events the appellant did not hold the presidency or vice-presidency of the company, and that his responsibilities were strictly limited to production. He also noted there were no direct testimonies placing Müller at the moment the torture was committed, and that his later participation in public acts supporting the de facto government was not sufficient proof to ground criminal responsibility for the crimes judged. Under that interpretation, he considered the benefit of the doubt should apply.[S1][S2]
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Rosenkrantz maintained that establishing Müller's guilt beyond reasonable doubt was an intolerable error under a rational administration of justice, and that the defendant should be acquitted. The majority, by contrast, found the evidence sufficient to sustain the conviction.[S2]
The judicial path and the facts established
The case began in 2003 and took fifteen years to reach the oral trial stage. In 2018, Federal Oral Court No. 1 of San Martín convicted Müller as a necessary participant in the aggravated unlawful deprivations of liberty and aggravated torments of the 24 workers linked to Ford Motor Argentina. The crimes were classified as crimes against humanity, and the sentence included ten years in prison plus absolute disqualification for the duration of the penalty. After the defense appealed, the Federal Chamber of Criminal Cassation dismissed the challenges and confirmed the sentence.[S1][S2]
The ruling reviewed that before March 24, 1976, the company had requested greater security measures, and that Gendarmerie, Prefecture and later the Army installed themselves at the Pacheco plant until 1977. It was also established that 17 of the 24 workers were deprived of liberty at their workplaces, that nine of them were taken to a quincho inside the grounds where they were tortured, and that all were later transferred to detention centers. The majority noted that Ford authorities provided specific information on the kidnapped workers and drew up lists to identify them. The ruling held that Müller facilitated the identification and location of the persons to be detained and allowed some of them to be housed in dependencies of the factory itself, where they were subjected to torment.[S2]
