Peru’s public prosecutor’s office on Thursday approved a 15-year prison sentence for accepting bribes while governor of Moquegua from 2011 to 2014, demanding immediate enforcement of the sentence handed down to former President MartÃn Vizcarra (2018-2020).
During the oral trial against the former Peruvian president, prosecutors requested that the sentence be carried out without waiting for a second trial, citing the need to avoid the possibility of him fleeing. In this sense, he argued that the state cannot allow a repeat of the impunity observed in other processes against government officials.
He therefore asked the court to issue an “exemplary judgment” in the case, which he saw as an opportunity to “demonstrate the effectiveness of the fight against corruption in the highest spheres of power,” as reported by the newspaper La Repubblica.
In addition to Mr. Vizcarra’s imprisonment, the magistrate ordered that he be disqualified from public service for nine years for accepting about 2.3 million soles (about 536,000 euros) in compensation for his bids.
The former president, however, asserted that there was “no possibility” that he would apply for diplomatic asylum in another country, announced his intention to be present at the reading of the verdict, and defended his actions as showing compliance with the judicial decision.
After spending more than three weeks in preventive detention, Mr. Vizcarra was released in early September following an appeals court ruling that deemed the motives for the preventive measures imposed within the framework of the case for passive bribery “unfounded.”
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