Peru’s ex-president Toledo gets a second sentence in the Odebrecht corruption scandal

Peru’s former President Alejandro Toledo has been sentenced to prison time for the second time in a case involving Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht

LIMA, Peru -- Former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo was sentenced to prison Wednesday for the second time in a case involving Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.

Toledo received a sentence of 13 years and four months for money laundering, said Judge Josefa Izaga. In October 2024, he was sentenced to 20 years and six months for bribery and corruption in the case.

Authorities accused the former president of accepting $35 million in bribes from Odebrecht in exchange for allowing the construction of a highway in the South American country.

Toledo governed Peru from 2001 to 2006, and is the latest ex-Peruvian leader convicted for corruption related to Odebrecht. A few months ago, former President Ollanta Humala was sentenced to 15 years in prison for laundering funds from the company to finance his 2006 and 2011 campaigns.

Odebrecht built some of Latin America’s most crucial infrastructure projects, and in 2016 it admitted to U.S. authorities to having bought government contracts throughout the region with generous bribes. The investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice spun probes in several countries, including Mexico, Guatemala and Ecuador.

In Peru, authorities accused Toledo and three other former presidents of receiving payments from the construction giant. They alleged Toledo received $35 million from Odebrecht in exchange for the contract to build 650 kilometers (403 miles) of a highway linking Brazil with southern Peru. That portion of the highway was initially estimated to cost $507 million, but Peru ended up paying $1.25 billion.

Toledo, 78, has denied the accusations.

He was first arrested in 2019 at his home in California, where he had been living since 2016, when he returned to Stanford University, his alma mater, as a visiting scholar. He was initially held in solitary confinement at a county jail east of San Francisco but was released to house arrest in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic and his deteriorating mental health.

He was extradited to Peru in 2023 after a court of appeals denied a challenge to his extradition and he surrendered to authorities.

The sentences are to be served concurrently.

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