Marcelo Couceiro, the former soccer player who stole, was jailed and has now been released from prison to regain his life

Marcelo Couceiro He pointed to the bed and said he spent it there, covered up to his head and mostly peeked out to watch television. I was depressed. He recounted this in the house he had lived in since April 18, when he left the Mendoza jail where he less than four months from serving his sentence for the crime of armed robbery. Now she lives in the same house with her son, son -in -law and grandson, whom she met through video calls.

Couceiro gave Chiquito Bossio the right ball to score a header against Karera. In the First Division he played for Estudiantes, Almagro and Nueva Chicago; and in the Ascension, also in little bull, Quilmes and Los Andes, among others. The last stop, Students, with a promotion from Primera C to B. He enjoyed soccer, “but that’s all,” he said Clarion in the privacy of the room where he reviewed his recent history. The one with the “stain” that stays forever.

Then hang the boots, then, you have to work. He was a driver in a company -remise type- then he had a truck with a camera and was carrying meat. That is the life of any worker. In 2016, something started to be resolved. First, the death of his father; then a love breakup; and in the middle is a traffic accident with complete destruction of their work environment. One day he stopped getting upit became customary not to leave the horizontal position or to feed or bathe.

Without a job, money began to run out and the idea that she would soon be unable to feed her children began to resonate in her mind. On August 13 he was serving his sentence, now he enjoys a assisted freedom allowing him to leave three months earlier, thanks to managing attorneys Marcelo Carimi. Ang Turkish, who was a teammate in Chicago, is now a criminal and appeared on the scene in the final stages of a nightmare that began five years ago.

-How does the sudden thief feel, what is the first step since making the decision?

-I go and get a gun, I have no ammunition, I know no one will hurt me.

-But, “I got a gun” … How?

-I went to the neighborhood and said: I need a weapon. I paid him 5 thousand pesos. ‘What do you want with him?’ To defend my house, I said. I left there and started to calm myself. I always associate with good people, people who don’t steal. I don’t have a thief friend, but listen, you know: this is who made it, the rest … in every club there are people … in the fans … people who do things well and the others are doing it. bad.

-And then?

I got in the car and got out. I’ll go to (a store) and pick up what’s in the box. Three on the day I did the day they caught me. rally mode daw. Before that, that month, he did something else.

Do you remember how you felt while you were stealing?

-I felt a lot of things. Fear. I can’t believe what I did. I don’t know where my head went. I couldn’t understand why I did what I did. On the one hand depression, I want money.

-You said it was a deep depression. Did you seek therapeutic help?

-I voluntarily entered the April Clinic. I came out well, skinny, fine, fine. But I fell again. It was very fucked up. I always say that those who have not experienced depression do not know what we are talking about.

-Have you considered killing yourself?

-I had, I had (thinking) … yes. When I live alone. I never lived alone, I always have a partner, a partner. How many times have I thought, I don’t want to live anymore. I can’t imagine how to do it. I didn’t have enough balls to kill myself, but I thought about it.

-What were you thinking when they arrested you?

-There I got the record of everything I did. When I got to prison, I said to myself: ‘What am I doing here?’ In my career as a football player I ended up there. Not just me, I wondered, but everyone.

Life in pavilions

After his arrest, the next five years were behind bars. First from the mayor’s office, then to different prisons: Ezeiza, Marcos Paz, La Pampa and Mendoza. In each area, the common thread was soccer: in all they recognized it and that was presented as a benefit for a subsistence complex.

-Did they meet you in different prisons?

– There are always people who know me. everyone asked me the same thing What are you doing here? That’s why I didn’t have a bad trip. They took me, as they say in jargon, to countryside with them, to be with them at the table. I didn’t have a bad time, but I saw horrible things there.

-Like what?

-One day, in La Pampa for example, at six in the morning the person in charge of opening the doors for us just opened the one in front of me and hanged the child. They applied to the mafia, he knew they would kill him when he got out. There if you are for trafficking, violations, you have a bad time. For drugs too, but not much. If you are Bolivian, Paraguayan, Peruvian or another nationality, they will take you on the phone and talk to you with the family and ask for money and threaten to kill the woman. In Marcos Paz, they stabbed. Once a week they kill each other. They quarreled on the phone, there were five or six phones, one for each ranch, and one came to talk about it and they argued. large shots That ended when the guards entered to shoot at the ceiling. Not in Mendoza, nor in Ezeiza, I am with the political prisoners.

-How is that?

-They say that Lázaro Báez tore down a wall to make a big cell for him … all of that is a lie. Of course, they have a heater, fan, portable DVD player, don’t even have a television. There were 12 of us, Ricardo Jaime, Lázaro Báez, José López, the nuns and bags … everything was reserved. Ricardo Jaime is the one I talk to most often. Lázaro Báez was always very depressed … José López acted mad. He walked with a small ball back and forth. I don’t know if he did that with the intention of leaving for psychiatric reasons. With Jaime, a Talleres fan from Córdoba, we talked a lot about football. I was only a month old. One day they put me on the bus and transferred me. They don’t tell you where and where you came from and they keep you for two or three days in case you have an argument from the outside with someone who is already inside. And these people (N of R: for prisoners), through the peephole they put the mafia at the entrance: “When you come out we will kill you”, this, that … Oh, worse, they don’t do anything to you, they tell you nothing, and when you come out they steal everything. Stay in flip flops and shorts … Those are anti-jets, as they say in jargon. They beat you and rob you when you arrive.

-Did you pass?

-Nerd. Because many are from Mataderos, Lugano. Where I played are generally clubs in the city, everyone knows me…. So they took me with them.

-Which gave you peace of mind …

-Not really. Now they are fine and tomorrow, on the outside, everything is wrong. You need to get up first thing in the morning, pay attention to everything. It has not been easy.

Did you make friends in prison?

-No, in jail you don’t make friends. You can have a cellmate, but not friendship.

-And in football?

-Yes, what happens is you start to see yourself less over the years.

Did anyone visit you from football?

-Don’t. Only now am I interacting with people. They give me all the support, they know who I am, who I am. When I was young I ate bread with my baked wife, my family was very humble. When I had my first silver at 18, I was very generous. I have helped many people in our area. Money didn’t change me.

-Unless you don’t have it …

-Yes, added other things. When I stayed at zero, the world collapsed on me.

-You said that football has always been the link to prison. What did they ask you?

-What went into your head that you stole? Didn’t touch a contact? Why didn’t you become a technical director? I still don’t understand. All I could think about was the big depression and my life was meaningless. I thought of my children, I don’t care about my life.

– Do you think over time you will understand what “what went into your head” is?

I’ll get the answer. I did what I did for a reason, not because I was a thief. That was a month of my life and I was 47 years old. He had never stolen a piece of candy before.