Declassified Documents Key to Judgement Against Colombian Paramilitary

Court finds paramilitaries had “symbiotic relationship with Colombian state actors” – Briefing Book #778

Washington, D.C., October 4, 2021 – Declassified State Department and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports that “acknowledge the long-standing relationship between [Colombian] state security forces and the paramilitaries” are among the key evidence behind a historic $12-million judgement against a former Colombian paramilitary leader last week in U.S. federal court in Miami.

Federal Magistrate Judge Edwin Torres found that Carlos Mario Jiménez, the former paramilitary leader known as “Macaco,” was responsible for the murder of Colombian community leader Eduardo Estrada in 2001. The case was developed by the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) and the Colombian Commission of Jurists (CCJ) on behalf of victims in Colombia. More than eleven years in the making, the plaintiffs filed the initial complaint on June 15, 2010.

Colombian President Álvaro Uribe extradited Jiménez to the U.S. in 2008, where he was convicted and served 11 years of a 33-year sentence for drug trafficking. His extradition and the subsequent U.S. decision to focus solely on narcotrafficking charges, prevented thousands of victims of Macaco’s paramilitary group, the Bloque Central Bolivar (BCB), from seeking justice for assassinations, massacres, and other acts of violence. In 2019 Jiménez was released and repatriated to Colombia where he was immediately arrested on homicide and conspiracy charges (…)

Para seguir leyendo: https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/colombia/2021-10-04/declassified-documents-key-judgement-against-colombian?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=1bd466c6-a351-4c8e-a06b-b2a17b350632


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