BOGOTÁ: The 15-year-old shooter of Colombian presidential candidate Miguel Uribe, who was attacked in June and died in August, was sentenced Wednesday to seven years in juvenile detention.
The right-wing politician was shot in the head during a campaign event in Bogota by the teenager, who “must remain in a specialized care center for seven years, deprived of liberty,“ prosecutors said in a statement.
The teen was charged with attempted murder and illegal possession of weapons — not homicide — because Colombian law does not permit modifying charges after they’ve been accepted by a minor defendant.
Uribe, a 39-year-old opposition legislator, underwent multiple surgeries during two months in an intensive care unit in Bogota, and died of a cerebral hemorrhage on August 11.
The attack echoed the worst years of political violence in Colombia, where five presidential candidates were gunned down in the second half of the 20th century.
Videos of the June 7 attack show Uribe speaking at a rally in a working class neighborhood of Bogota before gunshots broke out. The bloodied candidate collapsed amid the screams of hundreds of supporters.
The minor shot Uribe three times, including twice in the head, before the candidate’s bodyguards were able to wound and detain the shooter.
Five others — all adults — have been arrested and charged with aggravated homicide in connection to the attack.
Police have also pointed to a dissident wing of the defunct FARC guerrilla group as being behind the assassination.
In recent weeks, twin guerrilla attacks have killed 19 people in Colombia, with a truck bomb in Cali killing six and a drone attack on drug-mitigation operations that downed a police helicopter killing 13 officers.
President Gustavo Petro’s leftist government blamed both attacks on guerrilla groups that split from the once-powerful Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in rejection of a 2016 peace accord.
The teen shooter charged in Uribe’s death will not be transferred to an adult prison after turning 18, a spokesperson for the prosecution told AFP – AFP
