FILE PHOTO: Peru's former President Alejandro Toledo appears in court for sentencing during his trial on charges of corruption related to the Brazilian company Odebrecht, in Lima, Peru, October 21, 2024. REUTERS/Gerardo Marin/ File Photo
LIMA (Reuters) -A Peruvian court on Wednesday sentenced former President Alejandro Toledo to 13 years and four months in prison for money laundering, his second conviction in connection with widespread corruption.
Toledo, 79, who was president from 2001 to 2006, was found guilty of using bribe money from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht, now known as Novonor, to acquire high-value real estate.
According to prosecutors, Toledo and his wife used $5.1 million to purchase a house and an office in an upscale Lima neighborhood and to pay off mortgages on two other properties. The funds were funneled through an offshore company in Costa Rica that Toledo created to launder the illicit cash, the prosecution said.
This conviction follows a sentence of 20 years and six months handed down in October 2024, when Toledo was found guilty of accepting up to $35 million in bribes from Odebrecht in exchange for awarding the company lucrative public works contracts.
The sentences will be served concurrently.
Toledo, an economist with degrees from Stanford University and the University of San Francisco, is serving his sentence at a prison on a Lima police base. The facility also holds former presidents Ollanta Humala, Pedro Castillo and Martin Vizcarra.
The Odebrecht corruption cases, part of the wider "Car Wash" scandal, have implicated governments across Latin America and nearly all of Peru's presidents this century. Another former leader, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, 86, is currently on trial for his alleged role in the scheme, with prosecutors seeking a 35-year prison sentence.
(Reporting by Marco Aquino; Editing by Leslie Adler and Kylie Madry)
