The former leader was found responsible for pressing witnesses to favor his judicial case. It will meet house arrest.
The former president of Colombia, Álvaro Uribe Vélezwas sentenced this Thursday to 12 years in house prisonafter being found guilty for the crimes of bribery in criminal action and procedural fraud. The decision was issued in the first instance by the judge Sandra Liliana Herediawho also imposed a fine of 2,420 minimum wages and one disqualification of more than eight years To exercise public office.
According to the ruling, Uribe would have promoted a witness manipulation network through third parties, including his ex -book Diego Cadenato divert judicial investigations that involved him. Although she was acquitted by the simple bribery position, the judge considered her participation in maneuvers that offered benefits to prisoners in exchange for testimonies that favored her legal situation.
At the moment, the condemnation It will not be effectivesince the defense of the ex -president announced that will appeal the sentencewhich will transfer the file to Superior Court of Bogotá.
A cause that shook Colombian politics
The sentence against Uribe, who is considered one of the most influential leaders of the last decades in Colombia, generated a strong institutional and political stir. It is the First time in the history of the country That a former president is criminally convicted.
The case began to take shape in 2018when the Supreme Court detected irregularities in testimonies used by Uribe to denounce the senator Iván Cepeda. Years before, Cepeda had submitted statements of exparamilitaries that linked the former president with illegal structures during his management as governor of Antioquia. Uribe responded with a complaint, but the magistrates considered that it was he who manipulated witnesses.
In 2020he was subjected to Home arrest for 67 dayssituation that led him to give up your bank in the Senate and thus move from the orbit of the high court to ordinary justice. The process faced several preclusion attempts, all rejected, until in 2024 the new attorney general Luz Adriana Camargo formalized the accusations.
The ruling caused international reactions. The US Secretary of State, Marco RubioHe harshly criticized the conviction and said that “Uribe’s only crime was to defend his homeland.” The answer was swift: the Colombian Supreme Court rejected the “interference” and the president Gustavo Petro He described Rubio’s statements as a “interference to national sovereignty.”
Meanwhile, the case is still open and the judicial future of Uribe will now depend on the analysis of the Court of Alzada.
Source: Ambito
