The downfall of Carlos Caicedo, the biggest leftist boss in the Colombian Caribbean, is growing increasingly severe. A first instance court in Bogotá sentenced him this Wednesday to nine years and eight months in prison and to pay a fine of 4.5 billion pesos. He was found guilty of irregularities in a contract to upgrade five health posts while serving as mayor of Santa Marta (2012-2015) and authorized a process that, according to the justice system, resulted in health impacts for the people of Santa Marta and a patrimonial loss of 5 billion pesos. The sentence adds to other corruption and sexual abuse charges against the former governor of Magdalena, who also had a failed presidential bid a few months ago.
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The court considered Caicedo guilty of the crime of contract without compliance with legal requirements, in conjunction with embezzlement (appropriation of public funds). He was found responsible for irregularities in a 2014 process to upgrade the Mamatoco, Bastidas, La Paz, Candelaria, and Taganga health posts. According to the ruling, he authorized his subordinates to carry out negotiations for the renovations “without the prior studies required by the contracting manual.” This allowed “the contracting company to appropriate sums that far exceeded the value of the works actually executed.”
Only one of the medical centers, Bastidas, was delivered. The irregularities resulted in “serious damages due to the demolitions of the health posts.” Both the patients and the city’s coffers, which participated in the process as a victim, suffered the consequences. “Besides interrupting medical care, it impacted income from service provision,” emphasized the judge. The execution of the contract was so disastrous that a new agreement was necessary in 2016. The administration of Rafael Martínez, Caicedo’s ally and successor, signed an agreement also full of irregularities to upgrade three other posts that still needed repairs or had even suffered damage.
Caicedo’s defense, which has maintained throughout the trial that their client did not sign the contract and that the health centers were eventually completed, has regretted the justice system’s decision to order deprivation of liberty despite it being a first instance ruling. “He is a person who could not disappear from the face of the earth overnight, who has defended himself (…) and who would continue to defend himself properly in freedom, without any maneuver,” said his lawyer at the hearing. “He could be free, waiting for the Bogotá Superior Court to decide whether he should be deprived of liberty,” he added. The former mayor has not spoken out and has restricted the visibility of his account on X, which now only his followers can see.
The complainants, meanwhile, have celebrated the decision. “Today, 10 years later, justice gives us the reason. Thanks to the investigative work carried out in Santa Marta, where we dismantled corruption in the health posts case, a judge sentences Carlos Caicedo in first instance,” celebrated journalist Lina María Peña on X, who noted that she and other colleagues had to leave the city due to threats over these years. Lawyer Julián Quintana, who represented the Magdalena capital in the process, emphasized that they will continue with other corruption investigations so that “justice continues to be done.”
Several right-wing leaders have also spoken out, recalling Caicedo’s closeness at different times with President Gustavo Petro, with whom he competed in primaries in the 2018 presidential elections. Former Uribista senator and ex-presidential candidate Paloma Valencia said that Tuesday’s sentence is an example of the contradictions of the left. “The Historic Pact [Petro’s movement], which always poses as anti-corruption, has too many scandals that are becoming increasingly difficult to hide,” she wrote on X. Senator Enrique Gómez, from the far-right National Salvation, commented on Caracol Radio that “it is a great opportunity for political renewal in Magdalena.” The Uribista Rafael Nieto celebrated that “sooner or later” journalistic denunciations bear fruit but lamented that the Colombian penal system is “excessively slow.”
The sentence consolidates a long trail of problems for Caicedo. Although his political force won the Magdalena Governorship in atypical elections last year, it did so with President Petro’s opposition and without being able to recover the mayoralty. After the elections, the president lamented the result in a Council of Ministers and pointed to the winners as representing “traditional politics.” Caicedo, who had welcomed various Petro supporters in his administrations in Magdalena, became angry. He traveled to Bogotá and, from Bolívar Square, threatened the president with a break that was finally realized a few weeks later. He maintained a solo presidential candidacy for several months, with the slogan of “a left alternative to Petro” and a voting intention below 1%. He withdrew in the final stretch to support Petro supporter Iván Cepeda, who posed with him before the cameras. The only consolation was the election of his sister, Patricia Caicedo, as senator of the Historic Pact.
Beyond his failed candidacy and corruption cases, the former mayor faces several sexual crime accusations. In one case, he is investigated for sexual abuse against a seven-year-old minor. In another, several women accused him of sexually harassing them when he was governor of Magdalena. Caicedo has denied these accusations. “Whenever important judicial decisions or electoral scenarios approach, setups, leaks, and smear campaigns reappear with the purpose of destroying my good name and public career,” he said.
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