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On the night of Saturday, September 19, 2015, a group of sailors from the National Navy arrived at Isla Grande, in the Rosario Islands of Cartagena. A luxurious Dutch flag sailboat was floating in the sea, in one of the most exclusive areas of this city, when the officers inspected it they found a crime scene that only five years later appears to have been resolved.
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Peter Putker, a retired Dutch veterinarian, was mourning his wife whose body was lying on the plan (floor) of the sailboat. His version: a group of hooded pirates attacked his yacht, named Lazy Duck, beat his wife, Durdana Bruijn, and then knocked him unconscious.
When Putker woke up, his wife was dead.
(In context: The unknown details about the Dutch crime in Cartagena)
Hernando Osorio, Peter Putker’s lawyer in Colombia, commented that on the night of the crime the couple was having a romantic dinner after traveling for months to various cities in the country.
They had arrived in the national territory a month before to visit Bogotá, Medellín, Santa Marta, Salento, among other tourist destinations. The sea voyage around the world had begun in 2012.
The version that the foreigner always told the authorities described about six pirates who boarded the sailboat to assault the occupants’ belongings, but the robbery had turned violent, to the point of ending Durdana’s life at the point of blows.
‘Why did the pirates strangle the woman and let the man live?’
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Colombian forensics, when inspecting the body of the Dutch, established that the woman died of mechanical asphyxia, challenging the statements of Putker, who maintained that the death occurred due to the blows delivered by the alleged gang of assailants.
This was not the only inconsistency for which the Colombian authorities singled out Putker as a suspect in the crime. Later, after a lengthy investigation, the Dutch courts linked him as the alleged perpetrator of the murder of his wife.
Evidence Against Putker
“Why did the pirates strangle the woman and let the man live?”
This was the first question posed by the Netherlands Prosecutor’s Office to investigate the crime.
Peter Putker and Durdana Bruijn toured Colombia for several weeks. They toured, among other places, Salento, Quindío.
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Putker was the main suspect in the murder, taking into account that only the two of them were inside the ship and only he could kill her, according to the Prosecutor’s Office of that country.
“They assume that he was the one who murdered her, exclusively, because he was the person who was with her on the sailboat”, Attorney Osorio had already stated in Putker’s defense.
In reality, this case is full of inexplicable and implausible elements of considerable weight.
However, the Netherlands Prosecutor’s Office had further questions involving the Dutch veterinarian: “How is it possible that, despite good Colombian research, no concrete traces of third parties have been found? Why did the suspect only call for help an hour after the robbery, when there was useful equipment in place for emergencies? Why were there no knots in the ropes and cables that bound the victim and the suspect?
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Among its evidence, the foreign investigating body pointed out that no forensic evidence of the presence of pirates was found; In other words, in exhaustive analysis of the sailboat, no fingerprints or DNA of third parties were found inside the boat.
The same entity even argued that Putker had possibly implanted false evidence to make the murder look like an assault.
The prosecutor in the case indicated that open cabinets at the crime scene suggested that a search had occurred, but if it was indeed an assault, The pirates let escape from their loot a handbag with 1,600 dollars and 1,380 euros (about 12 million pesos approximately), diving equipment, mobile phones and a laptop.
The Lazy Duck sailboat was acquired by the couple in 2011, since that year they have dedicated themselves to traveling the world.
“In reality, this case is full of inexplicable and implausible elements of considerable weight,” said the prosecutor in the case during a hearing.
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An unexpected turn
After presenting this evidence that would implicate Putker in the Durdana crime, the Netherlands Prosecutor’s Office indicated as a hypothesis that the married couple had a fight, in the confrontation the man would have ended up strangling the woman and invented a false scenario, with the pirates on board, to get rid of the responsibilities.
The entity requested that Putker be convicted of involuntary manslaughter, a sentence that would give him eight years in prison.
In the hearing that defined the case, which was held days ago, the Court of Utrecht, in the Netherlands, also took into account the scenario posed by Putker’s defense.
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The court stated that from the first moment Putker maintained his version that the events in which his wife died occurred during a robbery by pirates.
According to the Utrecht Court, the court found that there are indications in the file that support this statement about the theft, such as the traces of blood found on the boat and the injury that was established on it, because when the Colombian authorities arrived at the ship had some minor injuries.
Among other things, the court disputed the evidence provided by the Prosecutor’s Office, in which he considered that the elements provided are based mainly on the idea of how the robbers should have proceeded logically.
So it was considered that a robbery “is not always carefully planned and does not always unfold as the assailants had anticipated.”
(Tragic deaths of Colombians abroad that mourned the country)
Regarding not finding traces of the assailants on the sailboat, it may correspond to circumstances such as the tropical climate of Colombia, but that does not necessarily mean that the robbers who attacked the ship do not exist in the case.
“Putker and his wife had a loving and harmonious relationship. There was no indication of a conflict situation. Putker was known to be anything but violent. ” added the Court.
With these arguments, the court decided to absolve Putker of the crime of involuntary manslaughter, considering that he is not convinced that the man killed his wife. In addition, there is a history of boat robberies in the Colombian Caribbean.
For its part, the Netherlands Prosecutor’s Office stated that it will not file an appeal on the case.
With this decision, a long period of uncertainty about Putker’s criminal outcome would end; However, the question was raised, Where are those responsible for the crime?
ELTIEMPO.COM
