El Salvador sentences Nicaraguan man to life in prison for child rape
The ruling in La Unión follows a constitutional amendment that expanded the scope of the country's first life sentences.
By Neha Kapoor ·
Bismarck Anthony Maldonado Mayorga, a Nicaraguan national, will spend the rest of his life in an El Salvador prison after a judge in La Unión found him guilty of sexually abusing a girl. The Attorney General's Office confirmed the verdict on Wednesday.
The case marks the second time the country's courts have applied a life sentence for rape since lawmakers changed the rules. In March, the Congress amended the Constitution to allow life imprisonment for simple and aggravated homicide, rape of minors, femicide, and gang-related terrorism. Before this reform, life sentences were rare in the central American nation.
Prosecutors stated that Maldonado took the victim to a residence where the abuse occurred. The court in La Unión, a department on the eastern border with Honduras, handed down the sentence. This follows the first such ruling on October 30, when Wilmer Isaac González received a life term for a rape committed in the neighboring Morazán department.
Official records indicate that at least ten people have now received life sentences under the new framework. These convictions include cases of femicide, aggravated homicide, and the two rape trials. In September, a tribunal also sentenced a defendant to life in prison for aggravated homicide and robbery.
The constitutional changes apply the punishment to both primary perpetrators and accomplices. The law also extends the possibility of a life sentence to defendants who are at least 12 years old at the time of their trial.
