MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Kenji Fujimori gets suspended jail sentence

“I am innocent, I am not guilty of the crimes I am accused of,” Kenji stressed. He will remain out of jail pending the appeal

A court of law in Lima Tuesday handed down a 4.5-year jail sentence against former Congressman Kenji Fujimori and two other defendants in an influence-peddling case.

Fujimori and his fellow former lawmakers Guillermo Bocángel and Bienvenido Ramírez were found guilty of trying to bribe then-President President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018) to vote against his impeachment in 2017.

The “Special Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court sentences Kenji Fujimori, Guillermo Bocangel and Bienvenido Ramírez to four years and six months in prison, and suspends their execution until the sentence becomes final and/or consensual,” Peru's Judiciary announced on Twitter.

Fujimori has announced he would appeal the measure.

The three defendants had been caught on video negotiating their votes with Kuczynski in exchange for political favors. The case led to Kenji's distancing himself from his perennial presidential candidate sister Keiko. Both of them are children of former President Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), who is serving a 25-year sentence for crimes against humanity during his term in office.

Kenki Fujimori and the other defendants were also imposed a US$ 12,000 fine each disenfranchised for 18 months. Keiko is also facing corruption charges.

Kenji, Boocangel, and Ramírez have been expelled from Keiko's Fuerza Popular party.

After the so-called “Mamanivideos” came to light, leading to Kuczynski's resignation in 2018, the three of them were suspended from Congress. The video had been recorded with a hidden camera by the late former pro-Fujimori legislator Moisés Mamani.

The court accepted those videos as evidence after expert testimony corroborated they had not been tampered with.

Kenji said last week that he felt “totally disappointed” for the damage and pain caused by his time in politics and insisted “there was never any offer” for voting in favor of Kuczynski, who had granted Alberto Fujimori a pardon in December 2017, which was later reversed by a Judiciary decision.

“I am innocent, I am not guilty of the crimes I am accused of,” Kenji stressed.

Former aide Alexei Toledo was also convicted Tuesday but he was given a lesser fine.