“[On Sept. 26,] the 10th Criminal Court of Bogotá sentenced the former director of intelligence of Colombia's now-defunct Administrative Department of Security (DAS, for its acronym in Spanish), Enrique Alberto Ariza Rivas, to 12.5 years in prison for the crime of aggravated torture. In the first instance, the Court found him responsible for the persecution and psychological torture against journalist Claudia Julieta Duque.
Duque is known for her human rights activism and also for investigating the murder of humorist Jaime Garzón (1999), who was shot by hitmen in complicity with State agents. Duque's investigations were of such magnitude and involved heavyweights of the DAS, that this entity, with its own resources, dug up information about them to threaten and attack her, to the point of psychological torture and even having secret location devices in her security scheme.
For these facts, Ariza Rivas was found responsible, thus becoming the eighth former official to be convicted in the case. Also convicted were former DAS deputy directors José Miguel Narváez and Emiro Rojas, a former head of intelligence operations Hugo Daney Ortiz, a former director of intelligence Carlos Alberto Arzayúz, among others.”
