Independent journalist sentenced to two years’ house arrest

CUBA: Independent journalist sentenced to two years’ house arrest

New York, November 8, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists
condemns the sentence of two years’ house arrest handed down by a Cuban
court to a journalist who reported on a dengue fever outbreak that the
authorities censored.

Journalist Guillermo Espinosa Rodríguez of the independent agency
Agencia de Prensa Libre Oriental (APLO) was convicted by a court in the
eastern city of Santiago de Cuba on the uniquely Cuban charge of “social
dangerousness.” The authorities often use this vaguely worded charge to
silence critics. Under article 72 of the Cuban Penal Code, “any person
shall be deemed dangerous if he or she has shown proclivity to commit
crimes demonstrated by conduct that is in manifest contradiction with
the norms of socialist morality.” It is punishable by up to four years
in prison.

Espinosa Rodríguez had been covering an outbreak of dengue fever in
Santiago de Cuba since July. Authorities suppressed news of the outbreak
which was not reported in the official press. He had been detained for a
few hours at least three times during the last three months, and warned
that he would go to jail if he did not stop writing “lies,” his cousin
Diosmel Rodríguez told CPJ. Espinosa Rodríguez was fired by the
government from his job as a nurse three months ago because of his
writing, CPJ sources said.

Espinosa Rodríguez was last detained on October 26 by State
Security agents and kept for 12 days at their headquarters in Santiago
de Cuba, according to CPJ sources. He was released on Tuesday after a
45-minute trial.

“It is outrageous that the Cuban authorities would seek to censor
an outbreak of a deadly disease and punish a journalist for performing a
vital public service by exposing it,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel
Simon. “We demand that Cuban authorities lift the house arrest order
against Guillermo Espinosa Rodríguez, and release the other 24
journalists unjustly imprisoned today in Cuba.”

Diosmel Rodríguez told CPJ that the sentence allows his cousin to
leave his home to go to work, but bars him from attending public
gatherings and from leaving Santiago de Cuba. The court also forbade
Espinosa Rodríguez from practicing journalism and ordered him to work at
a state-controlled office, APLO said according to the Miami-based news
Web site CubaNet. Espinosa Rodríguez was warned that if he did not
comply with the terms of his house arrest, he would be forced to serve
his sentence in prison, according to Rodríguez.

http://www.cpj.org/news/2006/americas/cuba08nov06na.html