Colombian network RCN Television released a video Tuesday of the primary evidence in the case against former politician Sigifredo Lopez.
Lopez is accused of aiding the FARC in orchestrating his own kidnapping in 2002, along with the capture of 11 other deputies from the western department of Valle de Cauca, who were killed in captivity five years later.
The video was found in one of “Alfonso Cano’s” computers, recovered after security forces in the southwestern department of Cauca killed the FARC leader in 2011.
The footage shows a man, presumed to be Lopez, explaining to a group of guerrillas how to enter the departmental facility of the deputies.
“On the first floor we find the main entrance … At this facility we have a potential enemy, first, the guards and police, who are there occasionally, and the bodyguards of some of the deputies, who are usually located in the cafeteria,” says the man in the video.
The video only shows the man’s profile for a few seconds, but based on analysis of the acoustic and linguistic qualities of the evidence, investigators for the prosecutor’s office have determined that the face and voice in the video belong to Sigifredo Lopez.
According to Lopez’s attorney Alfredo Montenegro, the defense filed a petition through the National Human Rights Unit to receive authorization to verify the video using new technical comparison methods.
“The accused has stated that he will only submit to techniques that are practiced by recognized international bodies like Interpol or the FBI,” said Montenegro. “We are expecting the prosecutor to order, based on the voice recordings, new methods [of comparison],” added Montenegro.
