After nearly 25 years of fighting for justice after being persecuted and harassed by Colombian government officials, journalist Claudia Julieta Duque has decided not to partake in a public apology the office of Colombia’s Presidency is scheduled to hold this June.
Duque says she is refusing because the same government issuing the apology recently appointed to a high-profile post an official she accuses of not presenting evidence in the crime against her. It is “humiliating and re-victimizing,” Duque told LatAm Journalism Review (LJR).
The attacks against Duque began more than two decades ago, following her investigation into the 1999 murder of journalist and satirist Jaime Garzón in which members of the now-defunct intelligence agency known as DAS were involved.
From 2001 to 2004, she was the target of threats, surveillance and harassment by agents and senior officials of DAS. Colombian courts later recognized this as “aggravated psychological torture.”
Since then, Duque has worked – including investigating her own case – to ensure that the crime against her does not go unpunished. Over the years, seven former officials have been convicted of torture, four of which are currently under appeal. The current public apology from the Presidency is part of reparation measures ordered in the 2024 court sentence against Enrique Alberto Ariza Rivas, former intelligence director of DAS, for the crime of aggravated torture against the journalist.
Despite this progress, Duque’s case shows how difficult it is to achieve justice in crimes against journalists. They often face long waits for rulings, re-victimizing acts by public officials and an overall climate of greater stigmatization of the press.
Duque said that once the Colombian government was ordered to apologize to her, the journalist’s lawyer contacted the Presidency to ask how the apology would take place.
After months of negotiations, Duque said, an agreement was reached that instead of an event featuring a speech by an official delegated by the president, a commemorative plaque would be installed.
However, when it was confirmed on March 10 that José Alexis Mahecha Acosta had been appointed as the administrative and financial director of the Administrative Department of the Presidency, Duque expressed her strong opposition.
“It’s the last straw,” Duque told LatAm Journalism Review (LJR) about Mahecha Acosta’s appointment. “He was not directly involved in the torture itself in my case, but he is involved in the denial of information, in the concealment of evidence.”
“He was the director of intelligence at DAS when the DAS was ordered to give me all the information they had on me,” Duque said.
According to Duque, Mahecha Acosta signed letters asserting that DAS had no information about her. A recent public letter from Duque to President Gustavo Petro includes a photocopy of a letter dated July 15, 2009 that appears to be signed by “José Alexis Mahecha Acosta.” The letter states that databases of the General Directorate of Intelligence had no information about Duque.
LJR contacted Mahecha's office to obtain his statements regarding Duque’s refusal to participate in the apology and accusations that he denied having information about her case. LJR received an automated response stating that the request was being processed, but no further reply.
The DAS was dissolved in 2011, upon the president’s orders after the "chuzadas” scandal, which involved illegal wiretapping of prominent figures in the country, such as judges, journalists, and politicians, was revealed.
Despite being linked to the Attorney General's investigation into the broader DAS scandal, Mahecha Costa was acquitted on two occasions.
“With complete confidence I can say the justice system has acquitted me twice, as no evidence has been found in any proceeding to prove my responsibility in the events,” Mahecha Acosta told the newspaper El Espectador in journalistic investigations carried out by Duque. “My acquittal was granted by two different judges—one from a lower court and one from an appeals court—and the Inspector General’s Office also requested my acquittal.”
During the investigation into the wiretappings, prosecutors found at DAS headquarters a document titled “Manual for Intimidation,” whose existence Duque had already reported. Knowing that Duque had a caller ID, the manual contained precise instructions on how to threaten her, including not staying on the line longer than 49 seconds and making sure there were no security cameras when placing the call.
Additionally, according to the 2010 annual report from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), an investigation by the Public Prosecutor's Office revealed DAS intelligence reports, mainly from 2003 to 2005, with information on Duque’s activities and other related information.
Following Mahecha Acosta’s recent appointment, Duque published two investigative pieces concerning the official in newspaper El Espectador.
Finally, on April 14, Duque published the letter she sent Petro rejecting her participation in the scheduled event on June 26.
In the letter, the journalist called Mahecha Acosta’s appointment “extremely re-victimizing and mocking,”
“I thought it would prompt a reaction from the president because he knows my work,” Duque told LJR. “I truly believed the president would in some way reflect and say, ‘I am on the side of the victims and not the perpetrators.’ It was difficult for me to realize that’s not going to happen.”
LJR contacted two officials in the Colombian Presidency to request comment on the journalist’s statements but received no response.
On April 22, Mahecha filed a complaint against Duque for "the crimes of slander and libel." The evidence Mahecha attached to his complaint, to which LJR had access, corresponds to Duque's personal posts on X, as well as the letter the journalist sent to Petro.
A little more than 10 days after Duque’s decision, fellow Colombian Jineth Bedoya Lima—who was also attacked for her work as a journalist and has also investigated her own case—released a letter addressed to the Attorney General announcing she is abandoning her own pursuit of justice.
In 2000, Bedoya Lima was abducted outside the entrance of La Modelo prison in Bogotá, where she had gone to report. During her abduction, she was subjected to sexual violence and torture.
“Justice is the only hope that moves a victim, a survivor or their families,” Bedoya wrote in the letter. “To think incessantly about the truth, about public shaming for the perpetrator, about a sentence that confirms (even though you already know it) that it did happen, that they did kidnap you, that they did torture you, that they did rape you, that they did kill you—that is an incentive.”
However, Bedoya continued, “my hope for justice is dead.” She explained that for 25 years she has fought, presented evidence and contributed proof, but has been unable to make progress. She said that her last hope lies in the implementation of the reparation measures ordered by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), which ruled against the Colombian government in 2021.
For Duque, Bedoya’s decision is completely understandable. “I think she has the right and the obligation to live outside of this process of constant re-victimization that it entails,” she said.
“I have come to the conclusion that impunity is a State strategy,” Duque said. “It cannot be that we [Bedoya and Duque], who are not even lawyers, are capable of confronting these men, identifying them, and everything else—and yet the so-called ‘justice system’ cannot rise to the challenge. It is something that hurts deeply, that outrages.”
Like Bedoya, Duque has at times said she would drop her case. However, when a judge is replaced, a new prosecutor is appointed, or some change occurs, hope returns and she resumes the fight. In her case, she said, a change in judge and her own persistence, along with that of her lawyers, led to four rulings in her favor in 2024, one of them against José Miguel Narváez, then deputy director of DAS. That ruling has been appealed.
“It is the story of our lives, because there is always a part of you that can’t accept impunity,” Duque said. “No one will ever be able to accept impunity.”
*This article has been updated to clarify that seven former DAS officials have been sentenced in the crime against Duque. One of the eight people initially reported was recently acquitted.
