A court date has been set in an upcoming trial involving a photographer for the news agency AFP, who two years ago was shot at while photographing near the sight of wedding ceremonies in Costa Rica for Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen and NFL quarterback Tom Brady. The trial is set for April 29.
Three men are facing charges for attempted homicide, including a Colombian national who was working as the couple’s bodyguard when shots were fired at AFP photographer Yuri Cortez and a colleague from the local press, Carlos Avilés, on April 4, 2009.
A Puntarenas criminal court has called a “private oral hearing” for April 29, the first step in a criminal trial, according to an order issued by judge Hernán Salazar.
The defendants are Miguel Solís, Manuel Valverde and Alexander Rivas, who formed a security team hired to protect the supermodel, according to the Judicial Investigative Police (OIJ).
The incident occurred near the Brazilian model’s home in the coastal town of Santa Teresa de Cóbano, where the wedding party was held.
After restraining the two journalists, who were on public property, the private security guards forced them onto Bündchen’s property.
After demanding the reporters turn over their photographic equipment, one of the bodyguards fired a weapon at the vehicle Cortez and Avilés were driving in as they left the scene.
A bullet shattered the vehicle’s rear window and ricocheted off the windshield, nearly missing Cortez’s head.
Another lawsuit was filed in September 2009 in a New York district court, accusing Bündchen and Brady of “exposing Cortez and Avilés to an elevated risk of a lethal wound, by authorizing employees to open fire with the intent to kill or wound.”
The New York court dismissed the case, saying it was out of the court’s jurisdiction, as neither Brady nor Bündchen lived there at the time.
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