Politics, Business & Culture in the Americas

Fujimori Handed Fourth Sentence



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Already facing the rest of his life in prison, former President of Peru Alberto Fujimori, 71, received an additional six years on Wednesday for charges of corruption.  At Fujimori’s fourth and final trial in two years, the Lima court also fined him $9 million for authorizing wiretapping and bribes during his 10-year rule that ended in 2000.

Fujimori had plead guilty to the corruption charges on Monday, cutting short a trial at which 60 Peruvians were prepared to testify against him.  By pleading guilty, critics believe Fujimori sought to avoid further embarrassing his daughter Keiko Fujimori, considered a frontrunner in the country’s 2011 presidential race.

Fujimori also avoided probing into an era in which the government is thought to have set up a vast spy network to combat the Shining Path terrorist organization, and then used the network for political gain.

Last April, Fujimori received a 25-year sentence for human rights abuses including murders at Barrio Alto and La Cantuta University.  Under Peruvian law, multiple sentences are not accumulative, rather guilty parties serve the longest they have received.  Peru’s Supreme Court is currently reviewing Fujimori’s appeal over the 25-year sentence, though observers say the verdict is not likely to be commuted.

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