Unofficial translation by the Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA). You can find the original statement in Spanish further below.

The Association for Justice and Reconciliation (AJR)

and the Convergence for Human Rights (CDH):

We categorically reject the ruling issued by the First Criminal Sentencing Court for Drug Trafficking and Crimes Against the Environment, High-Risk Cases Group B, presided over by Judge Marlin Mayela Gonzales Arrivillaga, which granted an alternative sentence in the form of house arrest to the defendant, retired General Manuel Benedicto Lucas García, in the case for genocide, crimes against humanity, and forced disappearance against the Maya Ixil people between 1978 and 1982.

In a contradictory argument, the defense requested alternative sentencing due to the defendant’s health issues and advanced age, while deliberately omitting that he has been held at the Military Medical Center—with privileges and full access to healthcare, psychological care, and geriatric care—since he was linked to this case in 2020.

Our demands as the AJR were that, given that he has NEVER been held in a public prison, for humanitarian reasons and to guarantee victims’ rights, he should remain in the Military Hospital to ensure both his appearance in the proceedings and effective judicial protection for the victims.

Contrary to those demands, in an expedited ruling drafted in 7 minutes (citing extensive jurisprudence and international mechanisms)—and despite the aggravating factor that the defendant is linked to other cases involving serious crimes such as mass forced disappearances in Military Zone No. 21 and the forced disappearance of the child Marco Antonio Molina Theissen, with the court having failed to dispel the danger of obstruction of justice, or a flight risk—the court issued its ruling.

We are faced with a ruling that prioritizes the defendant over the rights of the victims, forgetting that private interests must not take precedence over the collective rights of people—even less so when the crimes committed have been classified as ones of universal significance.

This resolution:

Undermines the victims’ right to justice, to the ascertainment of the truth, and to the deliberation of the offenses committed against more than 1,700 victims—girls, boys, women, and men (recorded in 31 massacres, extrajudicial executions, sexual violence, forced disappearances, torture, and other serious human rights violations) and endangers the physical and mental health of the more than 100 witnesses who courageously brought the case to trial throughout 2024, exposing them to potential acts of retaliation by the defendant, his family members, and his supporters.

We therefore demand that the Guatemalan justice system rectify the ruling issued by Court B, giving due consideration to the rights of the victims and thereby redressing the grievance we are facing.

Our fight has always been for memory, truth, and justice for the victims of genocide, and for a Guatemala where justice prevails; this ruling confirms the sad reality of a justice system that has been co-opted and corrupted by the powerful, and it compels and commits us to turn to international bodies to assert our rights as Guatemalans who are victims of the elite cabal that has held justice hostage.

Guatemala. July 15, 2026.

En español: