MANIZALES, Colombia (May 17, 2005)—In reaching its verdict yesterday the Criminal Court of the Specialist Penal Circuit in this Caldas province capital found that the defendants were members of a gang of killers that operated in the area.
The presiding judge called on the public prosecutor’s office to continue investigating the death of Sierra, managing editor of La Patria newspaper, because “there is evidence linking other persons” to the crime.
The person charged with actually carrying out the murder, Luis Fernando Soto Zapata, confessed and is now serving a 19-1/2-year prison sentence.

Sierra, 43, who was also a philosopher and poet, was shot on January 30, 2002, in Manizales, Caldas province, as he was arriving at the newspaper offices. He died of his wounds three days later in the Caldas Hospital.
His murder produced a nationwide outcry.

*Reprinted from El Tiempo newspaper, Bogotá, Colombia