Former Peruvian president Martin Vizcarra sentenced to 14 years for taking $640,000 in bribes while serving as regional governor
LIMA: A Peruvian court on Wednesday sentenced center-left former president Martin Vizcarra to 14 years imprisonment for taking bribes while serving as a regional governor.
Vizcarra, who championed the fight against corruption as president from 2018 to 2020, was found guilty of receiving bribes from construction companies while governor of the southern Moquegua region between 2011 and 2014.
Prosecutors said he received the equivalent of $640,000 in exchange for favoring the companies in the awarding of public works contracts.
Vizcarra, 62, showed no emotion as the sentence was read out at a courthouse in Lima.
He is the latest in a long line of former Peruvian presidents to be sent to prison, mostly on corruption charges.
Vizcarra always maintained his innocence.
He was jailed for 22 days this year as an alleged flight risk but was released on bail pending the outcome of his trial, which began in October 2024.
He will join three other former presidents — Pedro Castillo (2021-2022), Ollanta Humala (2011-2016), and Alejandro Toledo (2001-2006) — already behind bars at a special penitentiary for former leaders in Lima.
On Thursday, a separate court will hand down its verdict in the trial of Castillo.
Dubbed Peru’s first poor president, the former rural schoolteacher and trade unionist was arrested in December 2022 for trying to disband Congress and rule by decree.
He has been in preventive custody ever since.
Castillo’s arrest sparked mass protests by his rural supporters, which ended in more than 50 deaths.
Prosecutors have called for him to be given a 34-year sentence on charges of rebellion, abuse of power and grave disturbance of the peace. – AFP