"Ex-Peru President Fujimori convicted of mass murder, kidnapping
Karel Navarro / Associated Press
Alberto Fujimori portrayed himself in court as Peru’s savior.
Alberto Fujimori is sentenced to 25 years in prison. The verdict shows even former heads of state cannot expect to get away with serious crimes, activists say.
By Adriana Leon and Chris Kraul
12:35 PM PDT, April 7, 2009
Reporting from Lima, Peru, and San Agustin, Colombia -- Former President Alberto Fujimori of Peru was found guilty of mass murder and kidnapping today and sentenced to 25 years in prison, in a rare instance of a former head of state being found guilty in his own country on human rights charges.
The 70-year-old former agronomy professor, who during a decade in office brought Peru back from the brink of political and economic collapse, was found guilty of ordering massacres at the Barrios Altos area of Lima in 1991 and La Cantuta University in 1992 that left 25 dead. He was also convicted of the 1992 kidnappings of a journalist and businessman.
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Peru's Alberto Fujimori assails prosecution's case as his trial closes
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Daughter of Peru's Fujimori says she would pardon him if she's elected
The court decision was the latest twist in the saga of a political leader who came out of obscurity during a national crisis in 1990 to win the presidency, prevailing against entrenched politicians and novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, only to flee the country in 2000 as a corruption scandal unfolded.
The massacres were carried out by the Colina secret police unit that allegedly acted as a death squad. Fujimori maintained in emotional testimony last week that he was unaware of the group's activities and that it was under the command of disgraced spy master Vladimiro Montesinos. But the court found there was "no doubt" Fujimori authorized the creation of the unit.
The kidnapping charges involved the 1992 abductions of businessman Samuel Dyer and journalist Gustavo Gorriti, a vocal critic of Fujimori's shutting down the Congress and courts during a state of emergency.
"This court declares that all four charges have been proven behind all reasonable doubt," presiding Judge Cesar San Martin told a hushed courtroom.
Fujimori, who in testimony before the court last week protested his innocence and portrayed himself as Peru's savior, sat impassively taking notes as the verdict was read.
The guilty verdicts, which were widely anticipated, were immediately hailed by victims' families and human rights activists in Peru and abroad. Francisco Soberon, leader of the Aprodeh human rights group in Lima that led the legal campaign to bring Fujimori to trial, said: "They couldn't shut us up. . . . Our objective is to achieve full justice, remembrance and reparations."
Maria McFarland, a researcher at New York-based Human Rights Watch who was present for the verdict, said: "With this ruling, and its exemplary performance during the trial, the Peruvian court has shown the world that even former heads of state cannot expect to get away with serious crimes."
But the verdict was also criticized by the former president's many supporters in Peru who revere his legacy. An estimated 500 orange-clad fujimoristas clashed with union members this morning in Ate Vitarte, a suburb of Lima, outside the military facility where the tribunal met to read the verdict .
Fujimori's 34-year-old daughter, Keiko, is a congresswoman and leading contender in the 2011 presidential race. In a recent interview, she said she believes much of her support comes from the nostalgia many Peruvians feel for her father. She said that if elected, she would give her father a full pardon.
Fujimori was an inexperienced politician and president of Lima's La Molina Agricultural University when he became a late entry in the 1990 presidential race. Against all odds, and with strong support from a network of Christian evangelical churches, Fujimori won the race by presenting himself as the ultimate outsider.
He garnered enormous popularity during his two terms in office with a stream of public works projects -- schools, waterworks and electrical systems -- in parts of Peru where the state had never established a presence. His daughter said he built an average of one school a day during his 10 years in office.
Fujimori also subdued the Shining Path, a leftist guerrilla group that controlled two-thirds of Peru when he took office and was on the verge of an assault on the capital. Armed forces captured founder Abimael Guzman in 1992 and succeeded in breaking the insurgent force with surgical military strikes and local cooperation.
But Fujimori also entrusted much of the anti-terrorism effort to Montesinos, a shadowy figure who soon built a corrupt empire that involved the trafficking of arms, drugs and influence. Montesinos is in prison.
Fujimori fled to Japan in 2000 after videotapes emerged showing Montesinos bribing judges and congressmen. Soon after arriving, he faxed his resignation as president and embarked on a low-profile life in exile. Prosecutors in Peru, meanwhile, filed about 50 human rights charges against him.
But in late 2005, Fujimori gambled that he could leverage his high popularity into a political return. He went to Chile hoping to use it as a jumping-off point to reenter Peru before the presidential election. But Chilean authorities arrested him and a year later extradited him to Peru to face charges.
His critics say that Fujimori went to Chile thinking that country would never extradite him and that he simply miscalculated. His daughter said in an interview with The Times that, to the contrary, her father expected to be arrested and hoped that the extradition process would strip away many of the charges against him, which turned out to be the case.
chris.kraul@latimes.com"
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-fujimori8-2009apr08,0,1670805.story
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