Forty years after the events were perpetrated and 20 after the beginning of the tax investigation, the Manta and Vilca case has obtained this Wednesday an outcome with historical overtones: the Judiciary sentenced with effective prison sentences between six and twelve years to 10 former soldiers of the Peruvian Army who in 1984 sexually raped nine peasant women from the Huancavelica region, in the southern mountains.
In the bloodiest days of terrorism, the Government of that time declared various areas of Peruvian territory in emergency, installing military bases. However, there were regiments that, instead of fulfilling their mission of protecting the population, committed abuses of various kinds, using the counterinsurgency fight. That was what happened in two adjacent districts of Huancavelica: Manta and Vilca.
The ruling is emblematic because it is the first time that Peru opened a judicial process for sexual violence as a crime against humanity in the context of the internal armed conflict. But it has also occurred in the midst of headwinds: a couple of weeks ago, Congress approved in the first instance a bill that precisely seeks the prescription of the processes of those investigated and sentenced for crimes against humanity for events committed before July 2002.
In the public hearing, in the National Criminal Chamber, located in the Center of Lima, the verdict determined 12 years of imprisonment for Sabino Valentín Rutti; 10 years for Rufino Rivera Quispe, Vicente Yance Collahuacho, Epifanio Quiñonez Loyola, Amador Gutiérrez Lizarbe, Lorenzo Inga Romero, Raúl Pinto Ramos and Arturo Simarra García; eight years in prison for Martín Sierra Gabriel and six years for Pedro Pérez López. The sentence was reserved for three other former soldiers because they were contumacious prisoners. In any case, none of the convicted persons were present at the hearing.
Throughout the process, his defense focused on distorting the victims’ testimonies and maintaining that they were consensual relationships. However, the judges determined the reliability of the testimonies. “We are facing serious events. Although there are inaccuracies in the stories, it is no less true that the accusation of the culprits is persistent and credible,” the court noted. All those convicted must pay civil reparation of 100,000 soles (27 thousand dollars).
The arguments of Demus (Study for the Defense of Women’s Rights), the organization that provided legal and psychological support to the victims, were cited in the sentence, emphasizing that the sexual violations committed by members of the Armed Forces were massive and systematic. “It is not legitimate to use strategies of sexual violence as a method of intimidation,” it was mentioned in another passage of the hearing.
According to the Single Registry of Victims of the Reparations Council of the Ministry of Justice, more than 4,800 cases of sexual violation were reported between 1980 and 2000, of which 83% were perpetrated by law enforcement forces, according to the conclusions of the Commission of Truth and Reconciliation (TRC). The activist for the rights of women and the Afro-Peruvian population, Sofía Carrillo, dedicated a few words to the ruling of the Judiciary: “It was achieved. Thanks to the bravery of the women of Manta and a hug to the Demus colleagues who did not stop accompanying them in these decades of waiting.”
One of the most emotional moments was when the court determined the guilt of Vicente Yance Collahuacho, alias Duck, who violated Marilia, one of the victims who died a couple of months ago due to various health complications. Marilia was key in the sentencing by telling her case in detail in the book Our Voices Exist. “Will I forget about this the day I die?” he asked himself. Although it was not during her life, justice worked for her and her companions.
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