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🇧🇴 Bolivia /Elections & Politics

Camacho ends nearly six years of legal battles after final case is dismissed

From El Deber · () Spanish

Translated from Spanish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources Outcome reported
  • A court ended the case linked to Santa Cruz’s 36-day strike, leaving former governor Luis Fernando Camacho with no pending criminal proceedings, according to his lawyer.
  • Camacho’s defense says authorities opened or investigated about 11 cases against him during the government of Luis Arce, including the Golpe I, Decretazo and Carro Bombero cases.
  • Lawyer Martín Camacho called the cases politically motivated, but the article notes that the defense’s claims do not themselves establish a judicial finding of political persecution.

The dismissal of the criminal case over Santa Cruz’s 36-day strike has, according to his defense, brought Luis Fernando Camacho’s nearly six-year legal battle to an end. His lawyer, Martín Camacho, said the former governor and current Bolivian ambassador to Paraguay now face no pending criminal proceedings, restrictions or judicial impediments.

The decision, announced on September 4, closed the last case that remained open against Camacho. “We have concluded this last case, and from here we have to rethink what we are going to continue doing for Bolivia and Santa Cruz,” Martín Camacho told EL DEBER.

The lawyer said about 11 cases were opened or investigated against Camacho during the government of the Movement Toward Socialism, or MAS, and the administration of Luis Arce. Some reached trial, while others remained at preliminary stages before being closed. Cases that went to trial and later expired included Golpe I, Decretazo, Carro Bombero and the 36-day strike case.

Martín Camacho traced the legal campaign to 2019, when the first case connected to Golpe I was opened. He said Camacho spent almost six years facing different investigations and proceedings. The lawyer argued that all the cases had political motives and blamed MAS-linked officials and leaders, naming former Government Minister Eduardo del Castillo, complainant Lidia Patty, former state attorney Ricardo Condori Tola and lawmaker Rolando Cuéllar. The article stresses that these are the defense’s claims, not a judicial determination that political persecution occurred.

The final case concerned the 36-day mobilization held in Santa Cruz in 2022 to demand a population and housing census. It began on November 11, 2022, after a complaint by Marcelo Mayta Huanca, then executive secretary of the Regional Workers’ Center of El Alto. The Vice Ministry of Transparency later joined the case. Camacho and other Santa Cruz leaders, including Vicente Cuéllar, José Luis Santistevan and Reinerio Vargas, were named in the proceedings. A court ended the case after three years and eight months.

We have concluded this last case, and from here we have to rethink what we are going to continue doing for Bolivia and Santa Cruz.

· Martín CamachoCamacho’s lawyer described the dismissal of the final case and discussed his client’s next steps.
About this summary

Originally published by El Deber in Spanish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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