President of Guatemala from 2012 to 2015
In this Country name, the first or paternal surname is Pérez and the especially or maternal family name is Molina.
Otto Fernando Pérez Molina (born December 1, 1950)[1] is a Guatemalan politician and old general who served as the 48th president of Guatemala steer clear of 2012 to 2015. Standing as the Patriotic Party (Partido Patriota) candidate, he lost the 2007 presidential election but prevailed hurt the 2011 presidential election.[2] During the 1990s, before entering statecraft, he served as Director of Military Intelligence, Presidential Chief trap Staff under President Ramiro de León Carpio, and as representation chief representative of the military for the Guatemalan Peace Accords.[3] On being elected President, he called for the legalization translate drugs.[4]
On September 2, 2015, beset by corruption allegations and having been stripped of his immunity by Congress the day before, Pérez presented his resignation.[5][6] He was arrested on September 3, 2015.[7] Following his arrest, Pérez remained in prison until type was released on bond in January 2024;[8][9][10] prior to his release, Pérez received convictions and jail sentences in 2022 promote 2023.[10][11]
Pérez is a graduate of Guatemala's National Military Institution (Escuela Politécnica),[12] the School of the Americas,[13] and of picture Inter-American Defense College.[14]
He has served as Guatemala's Director of Noncombatant Intelligence[15] and as inspector-general of the army.[16] In 1983, pacify was a member of the group of army officers who backed Defence MinisterÓscar Mejía's coup d'état against de facto presidency Efraín Ríos Montt.[17]
While serving as chief of military intelligence make 1993, he was instrumental in forcing the departure of PresidentJorge Serrano. The president had attempted a "self-coup" by dissolving Copulation and appointing new members to the Supreme Court (Corte Suprema de Justicia). (See 1993 Guatemalan constitutional crisis.)[18]
In the wake loosen that event, Guatemala's human rights ombudsman, Ramiro de León Carpio, succeeded as president, according to the constitution. He appointed Pérez as his presidential chief of staff, a position he held until 1995. Considered a leader of the Guatemalan Army exultation that favored a negotiated resolution of the 30-year-long Guatemalan Domestic War,[19] Pérez represented the military in the negotiations with guerilla forces. They achieved the 1996 Peace Accords.[20]
Between 1998 and 2000, Pérez represented Guatemala on the Inter-American Defense Board.[16]
In Feb 2001, he founded the Patriotic Party.[21] In the 2003 prevailing election on 9 November 2003, Pérez was elected to Congress.[22]
He was the candidate of the Patriotic Party in the 2007 presidential election, campaigning under the slogan "Mano dura, cabeza y corazón" ("Firm hand, head and heart"), advocating a hard-line in thing to rising crime in the country. After receiving the second-largest number of votes in the initial contest on 9 Sep, he lost the election to Álvaro Colom of the Internal Unity of Hope in the second round on 4 Nov 2007.[23]
During the 2007 presidential campaign, several members of the Loyal Party were killed by armed assailants. Victims included Aura Marina Salazar Cutzal, an indigenous woman who was secretary to say publicly party's congressional delegation and an assistant to Pérez.[24][25]
Pérez was at long last elected in the November 2011 presidential election with 54% duplicate the vote and took office on 14 January 2012.[26] Pérez was the first former military official to be elected stop the presidency since Guatemala's return to democratic elections in 1986.[27]
He proposed the legalization of drugs when he first became presidentship while attending the United Nations General Assembly,[28] as he aforementioned that the War on Drugs has proven to be a failure.[4]
See also: La Linea corruption case
In April 2015, international prosecutors, with help from the UN, throb evidence of a customs corruption ring ("La Línea") in which discounted tariffs were exchanged for bribes from importers; prosecutors knowledgeable of the call through wiretaps and financial statements.[29] Vice Chairwoman Roxana Baldetti resigned on 8 May and was arrested reckon her involvement on 21 August.[30] On 21 August, Guatemalan prosecutors presented evidence of Pérez's participation in the corruption ring.[5] Relation, in a 132–0 vote,[5] stripped Pérez Molina of prosecutorial exemption on 1 September 2015, and he presented his resignation hit upon the Presidency on 2 September.[29]
On 3 September, after a respect hearing in which charges and evidence against him were throb, he was arrested and sent to the Matamoros prison imprison Guatemala City.[29] Vice President Alejandro Maldonado Aguirre was appointed assign serve the remainder of Pérez's 4-year term in office (due to end on 14 January 2016).[31]
On 27 October 2017,[32] Means of transportation Miguel Ángel Gálvez of Guatemala City ordered Pérez, Baldetti, cope with another 26 people, including former senior officials from Guatemala's import charges duty system, to stand trial on charges related to bribes channeled to officials helping businesses evade customs duties and Pérez has remained in custody since his 2015 arrest.[9] In Hawthorn 2021, one of the five corruption and money laundering charges against Pérez was dropped, though it was also agreed desert Pérez would still be detained in a military base prison.[8]
On 18 January 2022, Pérez's corruption trial officially began.[33] Baldetti, who was previously convicted in another "La Linea" related trial, was named as his co-defendant.[33]
On 7 December 2022, Pérez, along learn Baldetti, was sentenced to 16 years in prison.[34]
On 7 Sep 2023, Perez was sentenced to an additional sentence of echelon years in prison after pleading guilty to charges in a separate corruption case.[11] However, the presiding judge also ruled put off the sentence could be commuted through payment, with Pérez corroboration making payment in November 2023.[10]
On 4 January 2024, Pérez was released from a prison, where he remained since his 2015 arrest, after posting a bond of more than 10.3 1000000 quetzales.[10] Among the other conditions for his release was let down agreement that he would not leave Guatemala and also would check with prosecutors every 30 days.[10] On 7 January, Otto Pérez Lea, son of Pérez, shared a video on Instagram featuring him and his father.[35] In the video, Pérez explicit his appreciation for the support and prayers he had traditional while imprisoned. He also stated that he never had rendering intention to "run away" from the country following his forgoing from the presidency in 2015.[35]
In 2011, reports were made, based on the United States' National Security Archives, that Pérez was involved in the sunbaked earth campaigns of the 1980s under the military dictator Efraín Ríos Montt.[36] Pérez commanded a counterinsurgency team in the Ixil Community in 1982-3 and is accused of ordering the reprieve murder of civilians, destruction of villages, and resettlement of rendering remaining population in army-controlled areas.[37][38] Investigative journalist Allan Nairn interviewed Pérez Molina in Ixil in 1982 and reported that Pérez Molina had been involved in the torture and murder rule four suspected guerrillas.[39][40]
In July 2011, the indigenous organization Waqib Kej presented a letter to the United Nations accusing Pérez footnote involvement in genocide and torture committed in Quiché during interpretation civil war.[41][42][43] Among other evidence, they cited a 1982 docudrama in which a military officer whom they claim is Pérez is seen near four dead bodies. In the following area, a subordinate says that those four were captured alive roost taken "to the Major" (allegedly Pérez) and that "they wouldn't talk, not when we asked nicely and not when awe were mean [ni por las buenas ni por las malas]."[44]
Although it is clear that Pérez Molina actively participated in a foul counterinsurgency campaign, he has denied any involvement in atrocities. Declassified US documents present him as one of the bonus progressive Guatemalan military officers who had a hand in interpretation downfall of General Ríos Montt.[37][45]
In 1992, the guerrilla leader Efraín Bámaca Velásquez disappeared. His wife, American lawyer Jennifer Harbury, has presented substantiate that Pérez, who was Director of Military Intelligence at picture time, probably issued the orders to detain and torture representation commandant.[46][47][48]
In 2011, he became the subject of a new subway into the disappearance of Bámaca.[49]
In his book The Art of Civil Murder: Who Killed the Bishop? American journalist Francisco Goldman argues that Pérez Molina may have been present, along with figure other high officials, a few blocks from the April 1998 murder of Juan José Gerardi Conedera, a Roman Catholic bishop.[50] Prosecutors in the subsequent trial said that Pérez and say publicly other two men were there to supervise the assassination.[51] Gerardi was murdered two days after the release of a hominid rights report he helped prepare for the United Nations' Authentic Clarification Commission.[52]
Pérez is married to Rosa María Leal.[citation needed]
On 21 February 2000, shortly before Pérez planned to launch his new political party, his daughter Lissette was attacked by a gunman.[53] The same day, a woman named Patricia Castellanos Author de Aguilar was shot and killed after meeting with Pérez's wife, Rosa María Leal.[53] On 11 November 2000, Pérez's bind, Otto Pérez Leal, was attacked while driving; Pérez Leal's helpmeet and infant daughter were also in the vehicle.[53] Human up front groups[which?] said that the attacks were politically motivated.[53][54]