Spain hunts ETA member after U-turn on prison release

A week after freeing an ETA member serving a 2,700-year sentence for killing 22 people, Spain’s courts reversed the decision and on Wednesday ordered his re-arrest, an official said.

But police were now unable to find 53-year-old Antonio Troitino, member of the armed Basque separatist group.

Spain’s National Court “revoked its own decision to release him and ordered his search and capture” after prosecutors had appealed the decision, said a court official.

The court order was released in the early hours but police “have not found him,” the official said.

Troitino was arrested in 1987 as a member of the Madrid unit of ETA and sentenced to more than 2,700 years for 22 killings even though the maximum stay in prison in Spain is 30 years.

He was freed April 13 after requesting that the six years he had spent in prison before sentencing be discounted from his term.

The court subtracted those six years from the 30-year maximum jail time instead of the actual 2,700-year sentence because the law was not clear on the matter, the official said.

But after an appeal by prosecutors, the court agreed that the six years should be discounted from the actual sentence.