Alejandro Toledo, former president of Peru, was sentenced to 20 years and six months in prison on October 21 in a case related to Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction company involved in corruption scandals in Latin America. The accusations indicate that Toledo accepted 35 million dollars in bribes from Odebrecht in exchange for allowing the construction of a highway in Peru.
During the hearing, Toledo exercised his right to communicate with his lawyer and it was ruled that he would serve his sentence in a prison in Lima created for former Peruvian presidents. The 78-year-old former president was arrested in 2019 in California, where he had been residing since 2016, when he was accused of illegal acts related to Odebrecht. Despite legal disputes and his resistance to being extradited, Peruvian justice finally imposed the sentence.
Judge Inés Rojas mentioned that Toledo defrauded the Peruvian state and those citizens who trusted him as president. It was revealed that Odebrecht paid huge bribes in several Latin American countries to win government contracts. Toledo allegedly received 35 million dollars for favoring the company in the construction of a road to connect Peru with Brazil, a project that had a final cost much higher than planned.
Despite the severity of the accusations, during the sentencing, Toledo showed indifference and at times laughed, even when the massive sums involved in the case were mentioned. After being extradited to Peru in 2022, the former president remains in preventive detention, facing the consequences of his alleged involvement in acts of corruption.