LIMA - Peru’s Supreme Court convicted and sentenced former President Alberto Fujimori yesterday to 7 1/2 years in prison for giving a $15 million bribe to his spy chief, the third time he has been convicted since returning from exile in 2007 to face a raft of charges.
Fujimori, who suffers from heart trouble and will turn 71 this month, told the court he paid off Vladimiro Montesinos because he feared his trusted right-hand man was plotting a coup against him.
But critics say he gave Montesinos the cash to flee the country as Fujimori’s government collapsed in a corruption scandal in 2000. Montesinos was eventually captured in Venezuela.
“This was not a political sentence,’’ said Judge Cesar San Martin. “The decision today was based purely on the facts.’’
Fujimori said he would appeal the ruling to a separate panel of Supreme Court judges.
During his first term that began in 1990, Fujimori was praised for defeating the brutal Shining Path guerrillas and ending hyperinflation.
But public opinion later turned against him over his autocratic style and a series of bribery scandals.
He will likely spend the rest of his life in jail.
