After several hours and failed attempts to locate the defendant's lawyer, the judge in the case appointed a public defender, restarting the hearing at 11:00 a.m. During the guarantees control hearing, prosecutors presented evidence corroborating that the now accused man performed this act in public between December 2025 and January 2026, in the Altos de Las Praderas neighborhood. The public defender based their strategy on the argument that their client was urinating, not masturbating. Investigations by the Public Ministry (MP) into this case were initiated after a video of a man engaging in exhibitionism appeared on social networks. The provisional detention and the formal charges for the crime of corruption of minors were the decision adopted by the Guarantee Judge against the man denounced by neighbors of Altos de las Praderas, in La Chorrera, for the practice of onanism (masturbation) in public. The judge also left open the possibility of a precautionary measure of house arrest at the subject's mother's home, located in the Los Guayacanes neighborhood, prior to the payment of a fine of 7 thousand dollars. The provisional detention of the accused was requested by the Section of Crimes against Freedom and Sexual Integrity of West Panama. The hearing scheduled for 9:00 a.m. today was delayed due to the absence of the accused's legal defense, to which the Guarantee Judge warned that he could appoint a public defender.
