The Second Court of Quetzaltenango sentenced former warden Carmelo López Velázquez and former deputy director Luis Osvaldo Rivera García to 18 years in prison for the death of inmate Allan de León Uluán in the Cantel Penal Farm, Quetzaltenango, in 2020.
The inmate had been booked for allegedly carrying a firearm, but instead of taking him to the pretrial detention center for men in Quetzaltenango, he was transferred to the aforementioned penal farm, where there are convicted inmates.
Carlos Martínez, lawyer for the mother of the deceased inmate, indicated that this sentence marks a precedent for victims of extortion, torture and blackmail at the national level.
He indicated that the sentence, handed down on Tuesday, May 19, was for the crime of homicide in commission by omission.
He explained that the Penal Code establishes that whoever has the legal duty to protect also responds as if he had committed the crime when he fails to fulfill his duties, as occurred in this case.
He added that the two convicted men not only abused their power by transferring the inmate to a prison to serve his sentence, when the victim was in pretrial detention, but also, upon realizing that he had obtained his freedom through an acquittal, together with accomplices they increased the amount of the so-called “talacha” that they demanded.
For two years, the convicted men and their accomplices demanded at least Q200,000 in “talacha”; However, for Q6 thousand that were not delivered, the inmate’s life was taken.
The lawyer added that those convicted stated that the inmate died from Covid-19, when the forensic examination revealed that the cause of death was torture.
In addition, he called for victims to report these acts of corruption in prisons. He reiterated that this ruling sets a precedent.
The inmate’s mother also called for reporting this type of abuse within prisons.
He expressed that “there is justice in Guatemala, but these corrupt people must be denounced.”
She stated that her situation has been difficult due to “emotional exhaustion,” since her son’s father died six months after finding out what happened.
He stressed that his son was not a criminal and that, when he was killed, he was already about to leave after being acquitted.
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