Dusty
08-03-2011, 10:40
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2011/08/03/guatemalan-soldiers-sentenced-in-182-massacre/?test=latestnews
Three former special forces soldiers were sentenced to 6,060 years in prison each on Tuesday, for the 1982 massacre of 201 men, women, and children during the height of Guatemala's civil war.
Court filings say 17 Kaibiles attacked the community of Dos Erres before dawn on December 7, 1982, looking for missing weapons that guerrilla groups operating in the region had stolen from the soldiers days earlier. They accused the farmers of collaborating with the rebels.
While more than 40 soldiers guarded the perimeter of the community, the men raped and killed women and girls, and banished hundreds of people from the community, according to the filings.
Dozens of bodies were exhumed from a well in the community in the 1990s and the remains from 171 victims were recovered in all. At least 67 children under the age of 12 were among the dead.
Witnesses say villagers were tortured and robbed by the soldiers as part of a "scorched earth" effort to eliminate communities supporting insurgent groups at the height of Guatemala's 36-year civil war.
The court also sentenced a former army second lieutenant to 6,066 years in prison for the same massacre in the village of Dos Erres in Guatemala's northern Peten region.
Snip
Read more: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2011/08/03/guatemalan-soldiers-sentenced-in-182-massacre/#ixzz1Tz7OC4EE
Three former special forces soldiers were sentenced to 6,060 years in prison each on Tuesday, for the 1982 massacre of 201 men, women, and children during the height of Guatemala's civil war.
Court filings say 17 Kaibiles attacked the community of Dos Erres before dawn on December 7, 1982, looking for missing weapons that guerrilla groups operating in the region had stolen from the soldiers days earlier. They accused the farmers of collaborating with the rebels.
While more than 40 soldiers guarded the perimeter of the community, the men raped and killed women and girls, and banished hundreds of people from the community, according to the filings.
Dozens of bodies were exhumed from a well in the community in the 1990s and the remains from 171 victims were recovered in all. At least 67 children under the age of 12 were among the dead.
Witnesses say villagers were tortured and robbed by the soldiers as part of a "scorched earth" effort to eliminate communities supporting insurgent groups at the height of Guatemala's 36-year civil war.
The court also sentenced a former army second lieutenant to 6,066 years in prison for the same massacre in the village of Dos Erres in Guatemala's northern Peten region.
Snip
Read more: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2011/08/03/guatemalan-soldiers-sentenced-in-182-massacre/#ixzz1Tz7OC4EE