They acquitted Evelyn Hernández, the young woman raped and sentenced to 30 years in prison for having aborted

El Salvador justice acquitted Evelyn Hernández on Monday, accused of the death of his baby at the time of delivery, in an emblematic case of a country with severe legislation against abortion.

"Absolute, yes, it could!", wrote on Twitter the lawyer Bertha María Deleón, of the team that defended Hernández, aged 21, for which the Office of the Prosecutor had asked 40-year sentence.

After the revelation of the decision, a hundred women claiming justice in court burst with joy. "Alert, alert, alert that works the feminist struggle for Latin America! ", they chanted.

"Thanks to God justice was done. I also thank you for being here, "Hernandez said as he left the Ciudad Delgado justice center on the north-eastern outskirts of San Salvador, where the trial was held.

Following the decision of Judge José Jurado Martínez, the prosecutors withdrew from the court without making statements to the press. The prosecution has 10 days to Appeal the decision.

Amnesty International's director for the Americas, Erika Guevara, said in a statement: "It's a resounding victory for women's rights in El Salvador ".

The organization called on the Salvadorian State to put an end to "the shameful and discriminatory practice of criminalize women", repealing the" anti-abortion rules ".

Hernandez was sentenced in July 2017 to 30 years in prison for the same offenses, but his conviction was overturned in February of this year by the Criminal Court of the Supreme Court of Justice.

"It was hard all the time I was inside," said the young woman, referring to the 33 months he was in prison after his first sentence.

"My future is to continue to study and advance my goals, I am happy," he said on Monday, visibly excited.

"There was no crime"

"Today, we have another proof that there was no crimethat there was nothing to pursue, "said Arnau Baulenas, a lawyer at the Central American Jesuit University's Institute of Human Rights (IDHUCA), after his legal proceedings.

Baulenas, who joined Hernández's defense, lamented that many cases of women in El Salvador are being prosecuted "for religious beliefs".

The case of Hernández goes back to April 6, 2016, when the young woman had had an "outpatient delivery" in a bathroom Then, when she arrived at a hospital in the city of Cojutepeque (east), she was arrested and accused of aggravated homicide.

The Legal Medicine Institute has not conclusively concluded what happened, although the defense is convinced that the baby is born dead because he's inhaled meconium, the first excrement that, when he is expelled into the belly, hurts the fetus.

In response to an appeal from his defense, the Supreme Court of Justice canceled last October the sentence of 30 years in prison for homicide aggravated by "lack of foundation and violation of the rules of sound criticism" in the evidence presented.

After this resounding resolution, the court ordered the release of the young woman last February and the opening of a new trial in a different court.

Failure opens the hope

"This is a very important decision because it opens the hope of regaining the freedom of all women sentenced or deprived of their liberty at the time," he said. AFP the coordinator of the Citizen Association for the Decriminalization of Therapeutic, Ethical and Eugenic Abortion, Morena Herrera.

In El Salvador currently there are 16 women imprisoned for abortion or pregnancy loss, in some cases in obstetric emergencies, under legislation prohibiting termination of pregnancy in any form.

The Salvadoran Criminal Code, in its article 133, establishes a penalty of 2 to 8 years of abortion. Prosecutors and judges, however, call cases of abortions, even spontaneous, "aggravated homicide", a crime punishable by 30 to 50 years in prison.

In the past year, five women sentenced in this type of case have been released, some with a commuted sentence.