The rock guitarist behind the first U.S conviction of a former Latin American president
The rock guitarist behind the first U.S conviction of a former Latin American president
Harvard law grad Thomas Becker went to Bolivia in 2005 and ran into street protests demanding justice for the deaths of more than 50 people. He left his rock band to help win a landmark court case against a former Bolivian president.
Por: Lorena Arroyo,
Luis Velarde
Publicado: abr 12, 2018 | 11:03 AM EDT
FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida --- A 30-something man, with a long face and tousled blond hair, pushed the wheelchair of an indigenous young woman from Bolivia leaving a federal courtroom. The man, dressed in a tight black suit and narrow tie, was once the lead guitarist for Beautiful Bodies, an alternative rock band that tours the United States and Europe.
He stopped performing to put a former Latin American president and his defense minister on trial.
Thomas Becker is one of the lawyers at the Harvard Law School's International Human Rights Clinic who helped nine indigenous Aymara Bolivians score an unprecedented victory in a civil trial in Fort Lauderdale. A jury ruled that former Bolivian President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada and Defense Minister Carlos Sánchez Berzaín were responsible for the extrajudicial execution of eight people during a wave of street protests in 2003 that left more than 50 dead.
“It's the first trial in the history of the United States of a former president who has to respond directly to his accusers,” Becker said shortly after he learned the jury's decision last week.
More:
https://www.univision.com/univision-news/united-states/the-rock-guitarist-behind-the-first-us-conviction-of-a-former-latin-american-president
