The 29-year-old visual, graffiti and tattoo artist and mother of a 6-year-old is serving a ten-year prison sentence for sedition.
HAVANA TIMES – Jessica Torres Calvo is one of 15 artists suffering political imprisonment in Cuba, according to a list by the Cultural Rights Observatory. Torres Calvo and Maria Cristina Garrido are the two Cuban creators sentenced by the government for participating in the July 11, 2021, protests.
The 29-year-old visual artist, graffiti artist, and tattoo artist is serving a ten-year prison sentence for sedition and receives biweekly visits. She is the mother of a 6-year-old boy.
11J, the Turning Point
On July 11, 2021 (11J) Jessica joined the protests that occurred throughout the country. She peacefully demonstrated alongside hundreds of Cubans in Holguín. When the protest turned violent, she urged others not to throw stones, according to Artists at Risk Connection.
Seven days later (July 17), political police agents arrived at her home without a court order under the pretext of “talking” to her. She was taken to the criminal instruction room in Holguín for interrogation and spent 24 days without being able to communicate with her family.
Initially, she was accused of inciting violence during the protests. Later, she was released on bail.
In November 2021, she learned that she was accused of sedition, for which Cuban prosecutor Fernando Sara Planas requested a 27-year prison sentence. She was also accused of abandoning her son to engage in sex work, an accusation that Artists at Risk Connection said was false.
Her trial