El Salvador sentences former president protected by Nicaragua to 14 years in prison
A court in El Salvador has sentenced former President Mauricio Funes to 14 years in prison for his involvement with local criminal groups and gangs and failure to fulfill duties to the country.
The sentence was handed down on Monday (29).
In addition to Funes, his former defense minister, David Munguia, received 18 years in jail.
“We were able to verify that these two former officials, who had an obligation to protect Salvadorans, traded their lives in exchange for electoral favors, acting as gang members,” said the attorney general of El Salvador, Rodolfo Delgado.
For El Salvador’s prosecutors, former Minister David Munguia also participated in criminal association and failed to fulfill his state obligations in promoting the truce plan negotiated with the country’s gangs in 2012.
As he left the hearing, Munguia stated that he “believed that his sentence was politically based and that the charges were unfounded.”
Outside of El Salvador, former president Mauricio Funes, who ruled the country between 2009 and 2014 and is currently protected by Nicaragua’s president Daniel Ortega, from whom he received “Nicaraguan citizenship,” has not commented on the conviction.
In 2016, amid an investigation for corruption and illicit enrichment, Mauricio Funes, fearing a conviction, requested asylum from the Nicaraguan regime for himself and his family and was granted it.
According to the Nicaraguan Constitution, Nicaraguan citizens cannot be deported, which frees Funes from serving his sentence.
With information from Gazeta do Povo
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