Guatemala, Mexico City, Geneva, Johannesburg, San José, Washington DC – May 6, 2024.
The second trial against the former head of the Office of the Special Prosecutor against Impunity (FECI) in Quetzaltenango, Lilian Virginia Laparra Rivas, will open on Monday May 6. The Public Prosecutor (MP) and the plaintiffs in the case accuse her of revealing confidential information when she was still head of the FECI. This is the second trial she has faced in less than 18 months. The undersigned organizations condemn the continued criminal harassment of the former prosecutor in retaliation for her anti-corruption work. We demand that due process be respected in this trial, which we will be observing.
Virginia Laparra is an exemplary former prosecutor and doctor of law who is the subject of two unfounded criminal proceedings for her work as a prosecutor, defending justice and exposing corruption. In November 2022, she was declared a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International. Her work as a prosecutor has been widely recognized, including the Prize for Excellence by Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo in March 2024, the Quetzal Prize for Democracy and Human Rights and the Ixoqib ‘Tz’i – Women of Justice Medal.
On December 16, 2022, following an initial criminal trial marred by several irregularities and which failed to guarantee her rights, a Guatemala City court sentenced Virginia Laparra to four years’ imprisonment for abuse of power. The sentence is not yet final. The former prosecutor thus spent almost two years in prison until she was placed under house arrest on January 3, 2024. Her detention was declared arbitrary by the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Several other UN and OAS experts also denounced the political nature of the criminal proceedings and the human rights violations committed against her.
In this new trial, she risks being sentenced to 5 and up to 8 years in prison. Unfortunately, at the start of the trial, arbitrary actions, unjustified delays and violations of her rights to defense and a fair trial have already been observed.
These two cases, which stem from complaints filed by a Quetzaltenango judge between 2018 and 2019 against whom former prosecutor Laparra had brought charges for alleged corruption, are clear examples of the manipulation of the judicial system to guarantee impunity for those responsible in large-scale corruption cases.
The undersigned organizations condemn the continued criminal harassment of the former prosecutor in retaliation for her anti-corruption work. We demand that due process be respected in this trial, which we will be observing.
We urge the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Judiciary to guarantee Virginia Laparra’s right to a fair trial before an independent and impartial court, with all the guarantees of due process, including a public hearing, in accordance with international human rights standards.
Finally, we urge the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Judiciary to put an end to the criminalization of justice operators, human rights defenders, indigenous communities and journalists solely for their struggle against corruption and impunity in Guatemala.
Signatory organizations
- Lawyers Without Borders Canada
- Amnesty International
- CIVICUS, Global Civil Society Alliance
- Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)
- International Platform Against Impunity
- Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights
- Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL)
- Foundation for the Right to a Fair Trial (DPLF)
- Be Just
- Latin America Working Group (LAWG)
- Bureau for International Protection in Mesoamerica
- ACTuando Juntas Jotay Program
- American Jewish World Service
- Impunity Watch
- Guatemalan Human Rights Commission (GHRC)
- International Service for Human Rights (ISHR)