Benjamín Ernesto Gutiérrez Collado

The former councilman who refused to repress in Masaya

Benjamín Ernesto Gutiérrez Collado, known by his family and friends as “Tikay”, is the political prisoner who worked as a councilman in the Mayor’s Office of Masaya and as a councilman representing the Nicaraguan Resistance Party (PRN), an ally of the governing party. When he was forced to participate in pro-government marches and join the repression, he decided to leave office before repressing what he considered “his people” who were protesting in the city of Masaya.

The death of his cousin-sister Carolina Collado, on June 23, 2018, as she left her work at the Masaya City Hall, while the police and para-state forces fired shots, served to raise his demand for justice and was the reason for the escalation of threats against him and his family by regime operators.

The threats for his refusal to repress, added to the persecution and siege, forced him to move to different safe houses, however a person who apparently collaborated in bringing him food, drugged him and facilitated that on January 13, 2021, members of the police surrounded Benjamin’s home in Masaya and illegally raided his house, arbitrarily detaining him.

It was at that moment that they physically assaulted him and then failed to provide him with adequate medical attention for the injuries he sustained.

The co-opted criminal justice system, the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Judiciary conducted a criminal trial, full of nullities and irregularities. Judge Fatima Rosales convicted him for the common crimes of trafficking in narcotics, psychotropic and other controlled substances and illegal possession of firearms, imposing an unjust sentence of 14 years and 11 months in prison and a fine of 790 days.

Benjamin is the beneficiary of Precautionary Measures, granted by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which has requested the State of Nicaragua to adopt the necessary measures to protect his life, personal integrity and health, as well as to guarantee the necessary conditions to ensure that the conditions of his detention are compatible with international standards and that he receives adequate medical attention, however, the State of Nicaragua has not complied with them.

Freedom for Benjamin Ernesto Gutiérrez!

We demand to the Ortega-Murillo regime: Free Nicas Now!