The triple femicide of Florencio Varela, which left Lara Fernández (15) among the victims, unleashed a media storm for the statements of his lawyer, Gonzalo Fuenzalida. When asked if it represents drug traffickers in an A24 interview with Eduardo Feinmann, he admitted without surroundings: “I am a criminal lawyer. As long as my fees are paid, they are welcome.” Feinmann, surprised, described him as “the lawyer of the drug traffickers” and questioned: “Does each lawyer choose what side to put on, no? There are values in life.” Pablo Rossi nodded, impacted by the frankness and lightness of the response.
Fuenzalida defends Lara’s family, who lives under threat: “They were told that they will kill them,” he denounced, demanding police protection after shots against the mother’s house. He also announced a complaint for these attacks, underlining the fear of his clients in a context of narco violence that hits the Buenos Aires Conurbano strong. In parallel, he asked that the cause not contaminated with suspicions about the young woman killed and remarked: “Lara had no relationship with drug trafficking.”
On Radio Miter, the journalist Mercedes Ninci pointed to that gray area in which many criminalists move: not everyone faces the same enemies. “Some lawyers go against the drug traffickers and other lawyers go against the narcos and those who let them work freely. Not everyone will go against Espinoza and Kicillof. There are lawyers who are going alone against ‘Little J’,” he warned. The suspicion grows because Fuenzalida is a partner of Brenda Uliarte’s lawyer, prosecuted for the attempt of magnicide against Cristina Kirchner. The phrase sought to make it clear that behind each defense there is also a political choice: how far you get, who is uncomfortable and who protects itself.
Although Fuenzalida insists that Lara had no narco ties, her role sows doubts about conflicts of interest or the origin of the financing of the fees. While he claims the universal right to defense and criticizes the state inefficiency against the mafias, the families of the other victims meet to unify legal strategies and claim justice in a scenario dominated by the shadow of drug trafficking.
