Peru: Former Intelligence Chief to Dictator Alberto Fujimori Gets 19-Year Prison Sentence Over Deaths of Farmers

The former intelligence chief of Peru during the Alberto Fujimori regime has been sentenced to 19 years and eight months in prison after being found guilty of masterminding one of the country's most heinous massacres that happened in the early 1990s.

Vladimiro Montesinos was already convicted to prison for other crimes, but his sentence was just added to with this latest trial where he pleaded guilty to charges of homicide, murder, and forced disappearance of six farmers whom the government at that time accused of being rebels.

According to the Associated Press, he admitted to ordering the slayings of the six farmers in the central Peruvian town of Pativilca. All six were accused of being members of a rebel group before being forcibly taken from their homes by soldiers and then executed under the orders of Montesinos.

His latest sentencing came just a little over a month after the president he served under, Peru's most infamous dictator, Alberto Fujimori, was ordered to be freed for what many find to be ironic humanitarian reasons. Now 85, Fujimori also faces charges in these particular killings but has pleaded "Not Guilty."

Montesinos has been in prison since 2001, as he has been charged and sentenced to various counts of corruption schemes and human rights violations as he served as the Peru intelligence chief to the dictator, Fujimori, masterminding many operations by the regime's infamous death squads.

Who Is Former Peru Intelligence Chief Vladimiro Montesinos?

Under the Fujimori regime, Montesinos was considered the de facto chief of Peru's secret police and the "man behind the curtain." He enjoyed almost unlimited power as he went after the regime's many enemies, as well as oversaw the dictator's many cronies.

Before he rose in infamy, he was a former military officer and a lawyer for drug traffickers in the 1980s. He then became one of the most powerful men in Peru after Fujimori was elected president in 1990, serving as his intelligence chief and leader of the country's secret police.

As the intelligence chief of Peru, Montesinos tried to establish a relationship with the CIA through its Lima office and tried to lobby the US agency to fund a counter-narcotics program in Peru, which he ran. He received an estimated $10 million in the 1990s, but the money did not end up fighting drugs but instead ended up in his pockets, according to PBS.

However, he did serve as a "fixer" of sorts for the US in Peru. However, his methods in fixing these US problems have been found questionable by many international observers, including the US government itself, blasting him as a "Rasputin, Darth Vader, Torquemada, and Cardinal Richelieu," for Peru in a 1997 US Army Intelligence report.

Former Peru Intelligence Chief Accepts New Sentence

As he was sentenced, the Supreme Court of Peru announced that Montesinos accepted the murder and forced disappearance charges against him. He reportedly asked for the "anticipated closure" of the case, which simply means that he has already accepted the charges.

The prosecution requested a 25-year prison sentence for him but was only granted 19 after the defense asked that his sentence be considered served due to him already being in prison for over 22 years, according to La Prensa Latina.

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Rick Martin

WATCH: Vladimiro Montesinos refuses to testify - AP Archive