Court reverses 10 army murder sentences

[Judi Lynn]

Court reverses 10 army murder sentences
Thursday, 25 August 2011 11:00
Natalie Dalton

Medellin's Superior Court reverses guilty sentences for 10 soldiers convicted of murdering civilians and disguising the bodies as combatants, in the first such reversal Thursday, reported Colombian media.

Ten officials from the Army's 4th Brigade had been sentenced to 30 years in prison after they were found guilty in a "false positives" murder in Medellin. The case concerned the death of Duberney Galeano Mira on June 6, 2002.

The military troops had given a version of the murder that indicated that the death of the Mira was a result of combat. The military officials had asserted that Mira was a member of the ELN guerrilla group and had confronted the troops with an AK-47 gun. However, testimonies indicated that the military officers had kidnapped Mira and later abandoned the dead body, according to Colombian newspaper El Espectador.

Regardless, the ten officials have been cleansed of the false positives charges.

Over 2,000 false positive cases are currently being investigated by the Colombian authorities, with around 500 military members linked to such killings.

http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/18554-court-reverses-10-false-positives-sentences.html

[gbscar]

1. Details about why the Medellin Tribunal ruled in their favor are still lacking, as far as I know

Nevertheless, in the event they happen to be guilty instead of innocent, there's still a chance to make one final appeal to the Colombian Supreme Court. If that doesn't work, then international tribunals will be the only option.

Hopefully the victims will resort to those mechanisms, if in fact these soldiers do not deserve to be free at all and have merely been cleared through questionable means. Right now, I certainly wouldn't rule that out.