Colombia’s Inspector General’s Office appealed the fraud and bribery conviction of former President Alvaro Uribe.
In an 81-page document, the Inspector General’s Office asked the Bogota Superior Tribunal to annul the 12-year prison sentence against the former president.
A Bogota court sentenced Uribe to 12 years of house arrest after convicting the former president of bribery and fraud in criminal proceedings.
The court found Uribe guilty of manipulating witnesses who had connected him to paramilitary groups.
Additionally, the court barred the former president from holding public office for eight years.
The Inspector General’s Office argued that the lower court based the sentence on “conjecture” and “not on compelling evidence that undermines the presumption of innocence.”
The watchdog also argued that a testimony was handled inconsistently and lacked credibility.
Unlike the judge’s assessment, there is no legal proof that Uribe instructed his lawyer Diego Cadena to offer witnesses benefits, according to the Inspector General’s Office.
A wiretap in which Uribe was heard telling his fixer: “proceed, doctor Diego” after talking about offering benefits to a key witness lacked context, the watchdog said.
It was not established beyond reasonable doubt that former President Alvaro Uribe had the required level of knowledge to attribute to him the alleged responsibility as the instigator of each of the events charged. The first instance ruling did not examine this core aspect in detail for each of the episodes examined.
Inspector General’s Office
The Inspector General’s Office also challenged the validity of the wiretaps as evidence, as they ignored Uribe’s attorney-client privilege despite the fact that Cadena wasn’t the former president’s defense attorney.
Uribe’s legal defense team has already indicated that they, like the Inspector General’s Office, would seek an acquittal at the appeals court.
Throughout this process, Uribe’s victims have argued that the Inspector General’s Office has maintained a pro-Uribe stance, and effectively acted as a second layer of defense for the convicted former president.
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