The former president of Peru Toledo sentenced to 20 years in prison for corruption

The High Court accepted the prison sentence recommended by the prosecution, it announced at a hearing attended by the 78-year-old, who led the South American nation from 2001 to 2006.

Toledo, an American-educated economist with a PhD from Stanford University, has maintained his innocence and pleaded for leniency, saying he has cancer and heart problems.

“I want to go to a private clinic. Please let me get better or let me die at home,” he told a hearing last week.

Toledo appeared calm in court as he was found guilty of collusion and money laundering for receiving $35 million from Odebrecht.

He took notes but did not speak at Monday’s hearing, smiling nervously as the verdict was read, making it clear he had been convicted.

The court found that he had accepted bribes in exchange for tenders to build two sections of an international highway linking the Pacific coast of Peru and the Atlantic coast of Brazil.

Toledo’s attorney told reporters he would appeal the sentence.

The former president was extradited last year from the United States, where he lived for several years before surrendering to a federal court in California.

Odebrecht, which has since changed its name to Novonor, has admitted paying hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes across Latin America to secure major public works contracts.

The so-called “car wash” scandal has seen dozens of politicians and business figures behind bars.

Toledo is one of several Peruvian presidents implicated in a massive investigation into the group, which admitted paying millions in bribes to Peruvian officials between 2005 and 2014.

Two-term leader Alan Garcia committed suicide in 2019 when police came to his home to arrest him.

In 2018, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski became the first Latin American president to resign over alleged connections to the Odebrecht case, which was not the first time allegations of graft had rocked Peruvian politics.

Alberto Fujimori, who led Peru from 1990 to 2000, stepped down when he was embroiled in a major corruption scandal and went into self-imposed exile in Japan.

He memorably faxed his resignation, but was arrested years later in Chile and sent back to Peru to stand trial.

Fujimori was released from prison on humanitarian grounds last December while serving a 25-year sentence for crimes against humanity.

He died in September at the age of 86 after a long battle with cancer.