A former top official of state intelligence agency DAS was sentenced on Thursday to eight years and four months in jail for the illegal wiretapping of government opponents.
With the ruling, the Bogota judge confirms the jail sentence Tabares and the Prosecutor General’s Office agreed upon in exchange for the ex-official’s cooperation with justice.
The former intelligence director of the DAS is one of the leading figures within the state intelligence agency who ordered the illegal wiretaps. His former immediate boss, Maria del Pilar Hurtado, recently fled to Panama to avoid prosecution after Tabares and other officials accused her, former chief of staff Bernardo Moreno, former Press Secretary Cesar Mauricio Velasques and former president Alvaro Uribe’s personal advisor Jose Obdulio Gaviria, of having been informed of the results of the illegal wiretapping.
The three presidential employees are still under criminal investigation. Uribe is under investigation by a congressional commission.
