Peru sentences its second former president to prison this week

Marcelo Rochabrun, Bloomberg News on Nov 27, 2025

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Former Peruvian President Pedro Castillo has been sentenced to 11 years in prison for conspiring to commit a failed rebellion in a bid to stay in power by dissolving Congress.

A judge in Lima issued the ruling against the left-wing leader on Thursday. Another former president, Martin Vizcarra, was sentenced to jail a day earlier for taking bribes.

Peru is notorious for incarcerating more heads of state than virtually any other nation and has built a special prison to house them. Castillo and Vizcarra bring the number of former presidents currently jailed in the Barbadillo facility to four.

Prosecutors had sought to convict Castillo of staging a failed rebellion while he was still president, but a panel of judges concluded he had only conspired to commit one. In December 2022, Castillo announced in a national address that he was dissolving Congress and the judiciary and would govern by decree from then on. Lawmakers immediately ousted him and he was arrested on the same day.

The court concluded Castillo hadn’t staged a rebellion because Peruvian law requires weapons be used to achieve the power grab.

Alongside Castillo, his former top aide Betssy Chavez was also sentenced to 11 years over the same incident. Chavez is currently holed up in a Mexican diplomatic building in Peru’s capital. Mexico has granted her asylum but Peru has refused to grant her safe passage so she can leave the country.

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