After two other witnesses recently revoked their testimoney against an ex-governor’s involvement with paramilitary, a third ex-paramilitary also has also denied being witness to the former governor’s “parapolitics.”
Alexander Gutierrez, alias “Picua” or “Giovanni Franco,” is another ex-AUC paramilitary who was supposed to testify against the former governor of the Santander department, Hugo Aguilar, as a witness to Aguilar’s ties to paramilitary while in office, a widespread scandal known as “parapolitics.” Like two other ex-paramilitary witnesses, Gutierrez has recanted his previous statements.
Unlike his previous testimony, Gutierrez is now saying that he does not know if he saw anything as far as the ex-governor meeting with paramilitary on a specified date: “that day I spent drinking, I had been drinking for three days in a row and so I do not remember if it was Colonel Aguilar or not,” newspaper El Tiempo reported the former paramilitary stating.
The former member from the AUC’s Center Bolivar Bloc allegedly testified in 2009 that he witnessed Aguilar meeting with one of the AUC leaders and asked for AUC “cooperation” in getting votes in exchange for providing arms and ammunition to the right wing paramilitary.
Ex-paramilitary Jesus Guerrero retracted his testimony against politican Aguilar earlier this week, following the retracted statements of another ex-AUC member, Luis Fernando Morales earlier this month.
