A Colombian court condemned eight soldiers to 20 years in prison for the “false positive” murder of a civilian whom they then presented as a guerrilla fighter.
The body of the victim, Sandro Alberto Montoya Mejia, was discovered on March 13, 2005, on a road linking the town of Guarne to the city of Medellin in the northwest Antioquia department.
According to the judge, there was no evidence that the victim had any involvement in insurgent activities or that he had been involved with a confrontation with the military.
“In no way has it been demonstrated that these soldiers acted in self defense against an armed attack,” said the judge.
The eight soldiers accepted their responsibility for the crime.
The case will be added to a long list in the scandal of “false positives.” The scandal was revealed in 2008, when a number of cases were discovered in which Colombia’s armed forces had killed innocent civilians and then posthumously presented them as guerrillas to improve army kill counts.