Tables Turned: The Manipulation of Guatemala’s Courts Against its Prosecutors

“I didn’t even have time to pack,” says Juan Francisco Sandoval, remembering the night that he fled Guatemala three years ago. After being ousted from his position as head of the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity, he knew that it was no longer safe for him to stay in his home country.

Under cover of night, he traveled over the border to El Salvador, accompanied by the then Human Rights Ombudsman Jordan Rodas. The next morning he was on a plane to Washington, DC. “But my case was just the beginning,” he says. 

Since 2021, 77 people have joined Juan Francisco in exile, including Jordan Rodas and dozens of former prosecutors, judges, human rights defenders, and journalists. Cristosal conducted an in depth investigation into patterns of political persecution in Guatemala and found that the biggest driver of exile is criminalization. Criminalization in this case is the mounting of spurious criminal charges as a means of retaliation. 

Prosecutor’s Under Attack

“It started with the end of the CICIG (International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala),” says Juan Fransisco, “The ‘Coalition of the Corrupt’ as we call them felt threatened by the investigations we were conducting and the cases we were bringing forward.” 

“Coalition of the Corrupt” is a term used in Guatemala to refer to a group of politicians, ex-military officials, bureaucrats, and business elites who have conspired to maintain impunity around corruption and human rights abuses committed during Guatemala’s internal armed conflict.

The UN-backed International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) operated for twelve years before it was ousted in 2019 when the Guatemalan government chose not to renew its contract. As an independent international body, the CICIG worked with its Guatemalan counterpart the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity (FECI) to investigate and try cases of high-level corruption. In its tenure, the CICIG brought forward 120 cases that resulted in hundreds of indictments, including against the former president and vice president in 2015.

But once the CICIG was shut down, the attacks against its former members began. “Once Juan Francisco was removed from his position we knew we were in trouble,” says Jose Daniel Mejia, a former prosecutor with the FECI who lives in exile in Georgia. With the help of Cristosal, he fled to El Salvador in 2022 where he lived for a year and a half before being granted asylum and moving to the US. 

“Cristosal helped me leave Guatemala and find a way to live and work in El Salvador while I waited for my asylum case in the US,” he adds. “It’s a bit surreal for me. I worked as a prosecutor for many years, then suddenly I was being prosecuted.”

Cristosal also worked closely with former prosecutor Nathaly Guerra who joined the exile community in the US in April of this year. “Once I became aware of the cases against me, I contacted Cristosal for support. They helped me get into El Salvador and contracted me to help with the anti corruption program in the San Salvador office.” she says. 

Nathaly first left Guatemala in February of 2022, when she became aware of five criminal complaints brought against her for her work in the FECI. She adamantly denies her involvement in these crimes, saying they are a clear form of criminalization. She explains that a former military officer with links to the corrupt actors she was investigating filed criminal complaints against her. 

“We’ve been investigating cases of corruption for years, so we know everything they did,” she says, in reference to the “Pact of the Corrupt” that she says is behind the attacks against prosecutors like her. “They don’t just want to remove us from our jobs, they want us out of the country.”

Court Co-opted 

According to Juan Francisco,both private and public figures are collaborating to shield those who committed war crimes and engaged in high-level corruption from facing consequences. “Under the Giammattei administration, the judicial system collapsed. Honest judges were removed from their positions and replaced. The nail in the coffin was the reelection of Attorney General Consuelo Porras,” he says. 

Consuelo Porras landed herself on the US State Department’s Engel List in May of 2022 for a pattern of repeated obstruction of justice, including “ordering prosecutors in Guatemala’s Public Ministry to ignore cases based on political considerations and firing prosecutors who investigate cases involving acts of corruption.” This designation under the USDOS Section 7031(c) prevents her or her family members from entering the United States. USDOS has named 52 others on the list. 

One of which is Ricardo Mendez Ruiz, the founder and representative of the Foundation Against Terrorism (FCT), a pro-military NGO in Guatemala that has launched dozens of cases against judicial sector workers and human rights defenders.

Daniel points to cases where private actors like FCT, despite lacking real evidence, can successfully bring claims forward. «The system is co-opted,» he says. «The courts are in their pockets.»

Hope for the Future

“The situation is extremely complicated and disheartening,” says Nathaly, sighing, “I don’t see myself ever being able to return to my home.”

Even with the change of administration and election of anti-corruption candidate Bernardo Arévalo in 2023, she has very little hope for her situation to change. “The President can’t stop the machine of criminalization in Guatemala. He can’t even stop cases against his own party,” she adds. 

Currently, the Attorney General’s Office is investigating a case into alleged corruption from the President’s party Semilla in what human rights organizations have denounced as an attempt to undermine the election results which were certified as free and fair by the international community. 

“I still have hope,” says Daniel. He still believes in the power of the Guatemalan people and all of the work being done by defenders in the country and in exile. “All of us are fighting every day, individuals and organizations,” he adds. Cristosal is one of them. 

Cristosal’s Guatemala Director Flor de Maria Salazar explains that Cristosal’s strategy works in both the short and long term. “We’re trying to respond to urgent cases like Daniel’s and Nathaly’s,” she says, adding, “But we’re also trying to address the general breakdown of human rights conditions in the country.”

“Our teams are documenting and reporting on everything that is happening in relation to human rights,” says Flor. Currently, the Guatemala team is working on a report looking at attacks on judicial sector workers and human rights defenders, like criminalization. The report is expected to be released this month. 

Cristosal also forms part of several international coalitions related to Guatemala and restoring the rule of law. Just two weeks ago, Executive Director Noah Bullock traveled to DC to discuss his concerns with human rights issues in the region. “Our community of exiles here is growing,” says Juan Francisco, “But we’re hard at work here in Washington. I believe we can win.”

Flor agrees. She remains inspired by the decades of struggle by the Guatemalan people. She pauses and says, “Our work is never easy, but it is always worth it.”

Cristosal needs your financial support to respond to emerging situations of criminalization. Please make a donation today.