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Wednesday, April 17, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

War Criminal Sentenced

LOS ANGELES (CN) - A Guatemalan war criminal on Monday was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for covering up his involvement in the 1982 massacre of nearly everyone in the village of Dos Erres, Guatemala.

Jorge Sosa, 55, of Moreno Valley, received the statutory maximum sentence.

A federal jury convicted him in October 2012 of making false statements in immigration proceedings and unlawfully procuring U.S. citizenship.

U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips also revoked Sosa's citizenship, citing his failure to disclose his involvement in the massacre of more than 160 men, women and children.

Guatemala waged genocidal war against its Maya majority in the 1970s and 1980s, killing more than 250,000 of them. Sosa was a special forces officer, a Kaibil. Top-ranking generals, colonels and presidents virtually always escape prosecution.

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