LIMA (Reuters) -A Peruvian court on Tuesday sentenced ex-President Ollanta Humala to 15 years in prison for receiving illicit campaign funds from a Brazilian construction firm, making the former leader the nation’s latest to head behind bars.
Humala and his wife were accused of receiving funds from Brazilian builder Odebrecht, now known as Novonor, in the president’s successful 2011 election campaign.
Humala’s wife, Nadine Heredia, was also sentenced to 15 years in prison on Tuesday.
The ex-president, a retired military officer who led the Andean nation from 2011 to 2016, will likely carry out his sentence on a police base built specially to house Peru’s jailed leaders.
Former presidents Alejandro Toledo and Pedro Castillo are currently jailed at the site, while Alberto Fujimori stayed there until his release in 2023.
During his trial, which lasted three years after an investigation which kicked off in 2016, Humala decried the charges as political persecution.
Prosecutors alleged Humala received the illicit funds in his 2011 campaign against Keiko Fujimori – the other former president’s daughter – through Humala’s Nationalist Party.
(Reporting by Marco Aquino; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama Aida Pealez-Fernandez)
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