Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Conviction Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Líbano, Tolima, Colombia · 2009

Colombia: priest convicted of abusing displaced children in his care — and the Supreme Court's landmark civil ruling

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Convicted

Authority role

parish priest of Líbano, Tolima

Organization

No organization assigned

Spiritual nexus

Children of a displaced family delivered into the parish's protection — the priest's custody was itself the Church's charity, and the Supreme Court's civil ruling hangs institutional responsibility on exactly that authority.

  • Pastoral or clerical authority

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2009-01-01 · criminal conviction; landmark civil ruling against the Church

    Colombian criminal court (2009); Corte Suprema de Justicia, Sala Civil (2015). Luis Enrique Duque Valencia, parish priest of Líbano, was sentenced in 2009 to 18 years for abusing two children, aged seven and eight, of a displaced family entrusted to his care. In 2015 the Corte Suprema de Justicia ordered the Church itself to pay roughly COP 800 million — Colombia's first civil condemnation of the Church for a priest's abuse, reasoning that the institution cannot detach itself from a priest 'subject to its authority'.

Appellate history

  1. 2015 · undefined

    undefined

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • custody of children of a displaced family entrusted to the parish's care

Primary record

Sources

national newspaper court reporting conviction and civil ruling report El Tiempo archive: the Duque case and the Supreme Court civil ruling.

National paper of record.

national newspaper court reporting civil ruling report El Espectador: coverage of the civil condemnation of the Church.

Independent national corroboration.

Related record

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