The appeals court of Colombia’s capital Bogota overturned former President Alvaro Uribe’s fraud and bribery conviction.
In a ruling of more than 700 pages, the Superior Tribunal of Bogota ruled that the prosecution failed to prove that Uribe led a criminal conspiracy that sought to frustrate investigations into his family’s alleged ties to paramilitary groups.
Consequently, the appeals court absolved Uribe of all charges and revoked the 12-year prison sentence imposed on the former president by the lower court.
The court’s reasons to absolve Uribe
- The appeals court said that some of the wiretaps that were used by the Supreme Court to open a formal investigation against Uribe were obtained illegally. According to the appeals court, the Supreme Court and the lower court that tried the former president ought to have suppressed conversations Uribe made on a phone other than his own as evidence.
- The testimony of jailed former paramilitary commander Luis Carlos Velez, who testified that he received bribes from Uribe’s fixer, self-proclaimed “gangstattorney” Diego Cadena, lacked credibility.
- Evidence of payments made to another former paramilitary commander, Euridice Cortes, failed to prove bribery as they could be interpreted as legitimate compensations for made expenses.
- The appeals court ruled that former paramilitary fighter Juan Guillermo Monsalve, who has long claimed that Uribe and his brother Santiago helped create the Bloque Metro paramilitary group, lacked credibility. Monsalve filmed Cadena pressuring him to retract his accusations against the Uribe brothers.
- The court also ruled that Uribe was not responsible for false testimonies that supported criminal charges against senator Ivan Cepeda. These charges were dismissed by the Supreme Court, which opened the investigation into Uribe.
The ruling was opposed by one of the three judges. In her dissenting opinion, this judge said that the lower court’s ruling should have been confirmed by her colleagues.
Cepeda, whose attorneys have been on top the criminal proceedings since they began in 2018, said that he would take the case to the Supreme Court.
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