Guatemalan ex-paramilitaries sentenced to 40 years each in Maya Achi rape trial

10:42 am on 1 June 2025

EDITORS NOTE: Graphic content / Former paramilitaries Simeon Enriquez (L), Pedro Sanchez (C), and Felix Tum react after being sentenced to 40 years in prison for crimes of sexual violence against six Mayan women from the Achi community of Rabinal during the civil war in Guatemala (1960-1996), at the courtroom in Guatemala City on May 30, 2025. The three former paramilitaries, also indigenous, were members of the Civil Self-Defense Patrols, created by the Armed Forces to fight the leftist guerrillas during the war that left 200,000 dead and missing, according to the UN. (Photo by JOHAN ORDONEZ / AFP)

Former paramilitaries Simeon Enriquez (L), Pedro Sanchez (C), and Felix Tum (R) react after being sentenced to 40 years in prison for rape. Photo: AFP / JOHAN ORDONEZ

By Sofia Menchu, Reuters

Warning: This article discusses sexual assault and may be upsetting to some readers.

A top Guatemalan court on Friday (local time) sentenced three former paramilitaries each to 40 years in prison after they were found guilty of raping six Indigenous women between 1981 and 1983, the bloodiest period of the Central American nation's civil war.

The trial against the former members of the so-called Civil Self-Defense Patrol, armed groups recruited by the army, began four months ago.

"The soldiers arrived late at night, threw me onto the ground and raped me," Paulina Ixpata, a Maya Achi woman, said during the trial. Prosecutors presented more than 160 pieces of evidence against the men.

"That's how the whole night went," Ixpata said, recounting how she was held for 25 days by the military patrol.

Judge Maria Eugenia Castellanos sentenced the three for crimes against humanity in the form of sexual violence.

"The women recognised the perpetrators, they recognised the places where the events took place. They were victims of crimes against humanity," she said.

EDITORS NOTE: Graphic content / Guatemalan Achi Indigenous women, victims of sexual violence during the internal armed conflict (1960-1996), are seen outside the Justice Palace before the sentence against of three former paramilitaries accused of crimes of sexual violence against them, in Guatemala City on May 30, 2025. Former members of the Civil Self-Defence Patrols, created by the army, were part of the state repression that fought leftist guerrillas during the armed conflict that left 200,000 dead and disappeared, according to a UN commission that documented the atrocities. The trial began on 28 January and is the second for Achi women who were victims of multiple rapes in villages in the municipality of Rabinal and at an army base in the town, some 175 km north of the capital by road. (Photo by Johan ORDÓÑEZ / AFP)

Guatemalan Achi Indigenous women, victims of sexual violence during the internal armed conflict. Photo: AFP / JOHAN ORDONEZ

This is the second trial in the so-called Maya Achi case, and follows reports of sexual violence filed between 2011 and 2015 by 36 victims against former military personnel, military commissioners and civilian self-defence patrol members.

The first trial, which took place in January 2022, saw five former patrol members sentenced to 30 years in prison. They remain incarcerated.

In 2016, a Guatemalan court sentenced two former military officers for holding 15 women from the Q'eqchi community, who are also of Maya origin, as sex slaves at the Sepur Zarco military base, a landmark case that marked the first convictions in Guatemala of military officers for wartime rape.

Both officers were sentenced to a combined 360 years in prison, where they remain incarcerated.

The court also stipulated a reparations program, whose progress remains limited despite advocacy by the 15 women who were at the trial, known as the "Grandmothers of Sepur Zarco".

- Reuters