In 2020, Spain's National Court (Audiencia Nacional) sentenced former Salvadoran colonel Inocente Orlando Montano Morales to 133 years and three months in prison for the murder of six Spanish Jesuit priests and two female collaborators, which took place in El Salvador in 1989. He was the first and only Salvadoran military officer tried in Spain for these events, in a case based on the principle of universal jurisdiction.
Jorge Agüero Lafora, a lawyer at Fukuro Legal, was part of Montano's defense team during the 2020 trial and in the appeals later filed before the Supreme Court. The most recent stage of the proceedings, including the request for conditional release resolved in August 2026, was handled by another firm.
A Case Built on the Principle of Universal Jurisdiction
The case reached the Spanish courts under the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows Spain to prosecute certain serious crimes committed abroad when there are relevant links, such as the Spanish nationality of the victims. The legal classification of the acts, particularly whether they fit the criminal category of terrorism, was one of the central points of the proceedings.
As Jorge Agüero Lafora explained at the time:
"At the time, we argued that Spain did not have jurisdiction to try these acts, particularly because their classification could be that of murder. In our view, this did not fit the criminal category of a terrorist act, which was the legal classification that allowed the Spanish State to try acts committed abroad."
The 2026 Release
In August 2026, the Spanish justice system granted Montano, now 84, early conditional release on medical grounds, due to an irreversible illness, following a request made by the prison where he was serving his sentence. RFI interviewedJorge Agüero Lafora, Montano's former defense attorney, about this decision. Spanish criminal law provides for this possibility: it allows for the suspension or early execution of a sentence when serious humanitarian grounds are present, such as an incurable illness, regardless of the length of the sentence.
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