Nine years after the assassination of the deputy editor of La Patria newspaper, Orlando Sierra, two influential Colombian politicians from the interior were accused of being the masterminds of his killing, and they were ordered imprisoned to prevent them from fleeing, RCN Radio reports.
A former leader of the Liberal Party, Ferney Tapasco González—currently in prison accused of maintaining links with the paramilitaries—and his son, former congressman Dixon Ferney Tapasco Triviño, who were sentenced to seven years in prison for the same crime, were accused for the crime of “aggravated homicide,” the Attorney General's office said in a statement.
Orlando Sierra died two days after receiving two bullets in the head in January 2002, inflicted by a contract killer who was sentenced to 30 years, El Tiempo says.
In his column “Punto de Encuentro,” of La Patria newspaper, Sierra made strong criticisms against politicians of the central department of Caldas, in whose capital, Manizales, the Tapascos are an influential family.
Note from the editor: This story was originally published by the Knight Center’s blog Journalism in the Americas, the predecessor of LatAm Journalism Review.
