Gregorio Santos, elected regional president of Cajamarca in 2010 and re-elected in 2014, and presidential candidate in 2016, walked free from jail on 27 July, apparently to resume the regional presidency of Cajamarca. He had been in jail for 25 months on charges of corruption. An appeal court turned down the attempt to keep him in jail for another seven months while preparations for his trial continued. He will still have to faces the charges against him.

As a condition of his release he will have to put down a payment of 100,000 new soles and accept restrictions on his movements. His release was welcomed with enthusiasm in Cajamarca, where he has led the movement against Yanacocha’s plans to develop the controversial copper and gold deposit at Conga. In the presidential election campaign he was by far the most voted candidate in the first round in Cajamarca.

As he walked out of the Piedras Gordas prison in Ancón, he criticised his detention without trial and that of thousands of other inmates in Peru’s penitentiary system. “Preventative imprisonment has leant itself to an act of political vengeance […] there are 77,000 people in prison, 60% of them abusively and arbitrarily”, he said, “justice is failing”.

http://larepublica.pe/politica/789038-gregorio-santos-dejara-la-prision-este-miercoles