Guatemala City: A Guatemalan court on Monday sentenced a former anti-corruption prosecutor to five years in prison or a fine in a case condemned by the US, the United Nations and Amnesty International.
Virginia Laparra, 44, was found guilty of leaking confidential information months after she was released on house arrest after two years in custody in another case that was widely denounced as stitched together.
In 2021, Porras was sanctioned by the United States, which included her on the list of “corrupt” and “undemocratic” actors.
Washington accuses the attorney general’s office of “undermining” democracy over attempts to delegitimize last year’s election of President Bernardo Arevalo, who won an upset victory on an anti-graft platform.
On Monday, a court in Quetzaltenango – where Laparra headed the regional office of the Office of the Special Prosecutor Against Impunity (FECI) – sentenced her to five years in prison and a $6,400 fine.
After the verdict, Laparra insisted she “doesn’t regret” her actions, despite being “jailed for two years for filing administrative complaints.”
Laparra was sentenced to four years in prison in December 2022 after being convicted of abuse of power in another widely criticized trial.
Last December, Guatemala’s Supreme Court ordered her release to house arrest after she had already served nearly half of her prison term, including pre-sentence custody.
Describing her as a “prisoner of conscience,” Amnesty International said Monday’s sentencing of Laparra was “another example of politically motivated persecution … of those who have fought against corruption” in Guatemala.
And US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols said on X-Day that the sentencing was the latest in a series of “tremendous attacks” on the rule of law.
The United Nations Office for Human Rights in Guatemala said on X that Laparra’s sentencing raised “concerns about the lack of guarantees for justice officials to carry out their role without intimidation, reprisals and attacks.”
Guatemala scored 23 on Transparency International’s 2023 scale of perceived corruption in the public sector, with 100 being the cleanest.
Arevalo, who has been in office since January, has proposed legal reforms that would allow him to get rid of Porras, who was appointed by his predecessor to a term that runs until May 2026.
