The Nuestra Señora del Rosario school, in the town of Riachuelo de Charalá, Santander, was not a normal educational institution.
One rainy day in 2001, the students went out to break and found that the water had unearthed a hand.
They informed the rector to take action, without knowing that she and her husband were complicit in the attempt to hide the body.
It was the body of Libardo Díaz, a coffee picker whom the paramilitaries had murdered, pointing out that he was an ELN guerrilla.
That story is one of many contained in a sentence signed on January 12 by the third criminal judge of the Bucaramanga Circuit.
The decision, after evaluating more than 20 testimonies, reveals how between 2001 and 2003 the paramilitaries turned the Riachuelo school into an operations center for the Cacique Guanentá Communal Front, which belonged to the Bolívar Central Block of the extinct United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia.
The sentence refers to the crimes then committed by three people: Gutiérrez, her husband Luis María Moreno and the paramilitary chief José William Parra Arroyabe, alias
Shuster
or
Diego.
They committed so many crimes that Shuster, although he benefited from the statute of limitations for acts corresponding to the crimes of violent sexual acts on a protected person and illicit recruitment, was sentenced for training for illicit activities and violent carnal access on a protected person.
That is, he escaped conviction for one rape, but was convicted of another.
He was sentenced to 24 years and 2 months in prison;
In addition, he must pay 300 minimum wages to three young people who were forcibly recruited.
Gutiérrez, for her part, was sentenced to 20 years and 9 months in prison for the crimes of simple aggravated kidnapping, violent carnal access to a protected person, sexual slavery and forced displacement.
In addition, she must pay 400 minimum wages to the two women who, being minors of only 13 and 14 years of age, were raped by the paramilitary leaders Carlos Alberto Almario,
Víctor
, murdered in 2005;
and Édgar Manuel González Malagón,
Carlos,
who was already convicted in 2018 for that and other crimes
.
Luis María Moreno, husband of the rector and former councilor of Charalá, was immune because the justice system took too long to prosecute him, so he benefited from a prescription, but the evidence indicates that he was part of the mechanism.
Gutiérrez and Moreno had already been sentenced to 26 years in prison for the murder of Díaz, since the justice system found that they participated in the homicide as part of the AUC's criminal enterprise in Charalá.
The system was clear: the paramilitaries were in charge and the principal and her husband provided them with the means and places to commit the crimes.
They even put their house at the disposal of the armed group;
They fed them, allowed them to hold meetings, parties and hosted them.
At school, Gutiérrez gave up his office so that paramilitaries could rape at least two girls, in addition to helping Shuster recruit minors “who were going to be delivered as a symbol of peace to the National Government as a gesture of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia.” given the negotiations that were taking place at that time, being a false positive.”
Several paramilitary leaders frequently stayed at the school.
Among them was Victor, who commanded the front;
Carlos, who accepted having murdered Libardo Díaz and said that he did it at the direction of Luis Moreno
;
and Shuster, who led the creation of the recruiting school that enrolled 23 teenagers.
His presence at parent meetings intimidated the population;
They participated with Gutiérrez in organizing bazaars and beauty queens to observe their students and then rape at least two of them.
Hernán Darío Rojas Rangel,
El Flaco
, urban leader of the front, explained in his testimony before the court that the former councilor and the rector “constantly organized lunches to attend to any visitor who arrived from the self-defense groups.”
He also reported that the commander of the Roberto Duque Gaviria Block,
Ernesto Báez,
was received twice by the couple at the school facilities.
The judge concludes that the husbands “maintained a close relationship with the illegal group Frente Comunero Cacique Guanentá, becoming a link between the problems that arose in the community and the rules applied by the organized armed group.”
Paramilitary domination, far from being a mystery to the students, was evident to them.
Pablo Enrique Mateus,
One of the recruitment victims says that the school's soccer field “was the paramilitary station.”
He was also known to his parents, as Elvira Pinzón, mother of three students at the school, testified.
“They told them that they were coming to take over [the town], they summoned her and told them, come and obey, no gossip, no commenting, they are going to do what they are told,” summarizes the sentence.
Mrs. Pinzón even explained that she did not remember when they arrived, because she “lived traumatized even after they left.”
The Moreno couple did not seem to be “pressured” by the armed group to serve.
The sentence presents several testimonies, such as that of Ernesto Báez, who agree that Gutiérrez and Moreno were part of the paramilitary structure.
In the words of one of the victims, Pablo Enrique Mateus, “the collaboration they provided was voluntary, it was like a bond of friendship.”
The presence of the front in the area was so deep that its political commander Luz Marina Eslava,
Yoli
, was a police inspector of the neighboring town of Cincelada between 2002 and 2003. The dominance ended with the negotiations between the AUC and the Government of Álvaro Uribe .
In 2003 the front was partially demobilized, including the minors recruited by Shuster, and in 2004 its final disintegration began.
Gutiérrez was the school's rector until 2013, when she retired.
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