Who is detained for the murder of Miguel Uribe Turbay in Colombia?

After two months in the hospital, Senator and pre-candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay died this Monday after being shot at a public event in Bogotá on June 7th. Uribe Turbay received several shots, two of them in the head, which kept him in critical condition for a long time. During the weekend, the Santa Fe Foundation, the institution where the senator was hospitalized, had reported a clinical worsening in which the patient "required new emergency neurosurgical procedures". The Attorney General's Office was one of the first institutions to react to the news and elevated the category of the crime to magnicide, which would imply higher penalties for anyone convicted. "The Attorney General of the Nation, Luz Adriana Camargo Garzón, deeply regrets the death of presidential pre-candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay and expresses heartfelt condolences to his family, friends, and followers," the Prosecutor's Office stated on X. On the afternoon of Saturday, June 7, a few minutes after the attack against Uribe, a minor was arrested, considered the perpetrator of the crime. That was the starting point of an investigation for the authorities in which no hypothesis is ruled out and in which five other people were already arrested. The next few hours will be of mourning and remembrance for Uribe Turbay, but in the following days, eyes will be fixed attentively on the progress of the investigations, the result of which may mark an already agitated political and social landscape in the South American country.

Detained

To date, six people have been arrested, including the minor accused of shooting the senator, whose identity is protected by the authorities. "The district government had already identified the conflict of the killer child," said President Gustavo Petro on X in June about the suspect, revealing that the minor had voluntarily left a peace education program in the past.

Since then, five other arrests have occurred.

The most recent was that of Elder José Arteaga Hernández, alias 'Chipi' or 'el costeño', whom the Prosecutor's Office considers one of the "masterminds" of the assassination. According to the Attorney General's Office, Chipi allegedly recruited those involved in the attack and planned the crime on commission. According to General Carlos Fernando Triana, of the National Police, Chipi has a criminal record of more than 20 years. Following his capture, the Colombian Defense Minister, Pedro Sánchez, indicated that this individual was the one who coordinated the logistical and operational details of the attack. "This criminal, who would have received up to 1,000 million pesos to set up the hitmen network and coordinate every detail of the attack, is already in the hands of justice," Sánchez affirmed. The suspect was already known since the 2000s for crimes such as assault, robbery, extortion, and violence in Bogotá. He was incarcerated in La Modelo prison. Although the intellectual author has not been identified, General Triana assured in June in an interview with Semana magazine that the group led by Chipi was hired as "criminal outsourcing", that is, a criminal group that carries out operations for hire. Other detainees are Katerine Andrea Martínez, alias Gabriela, a 19-year-old who allegedly provided the weapon to the teenager; William Fernando González Cruz, alias El Viejo or El Hermano, who was another of the logistical leaders of the attack; Carlos Eduardo Mora González, a Colombian-Venezuelan identified as the driver of one of the vehicles used in the escape of those involved, and Cristian Camilo González Ardila, who the Prosecutor's Office says was to be in charge of ensuring the perpetrator's escape.

What hypotheses are being considered?

No hypothesis about the motive and the masterminds of the crime is ruled out. Since the attack, the government, the Prosecutor's Office, and the National Police have commented on several of the lines of investigation. One day after the attack, the Minister of Defense, Pedro Sánchez, announced that it was being considered whether it had been an attack against the political figure represented by the senator, against his party, Centro Democrático, or an attempt to "destabilize" the Petro government. The president himself, in fact, attributed the crime then to "revenge by drug trafficking organizations against his government for the blows that the public force has dealt them." On more than one occasion, Petro has referred to a "mafia" that persecutes him and that also, supposedly, ordered the assassination of Uribe Turbay, although he has not provided evidence in this regard and the authorities are still considering other hypotheses. The Prosecutor's Office launched the investigation targeting an alleged network of hitmen. In Bogotá, criminal networks coexist, formed by small gangs and other more powerful and complex structures that commit crimes such as robbery, extortion, and drug sales. Current criminal networks in several Colombian cities do not answer to a single hierarchical command, but rather many operate under franchises or subcontracts that make it difficult for the authorities to find those responsible. Minors, such as the main suspect in the attack, are frequent targets for recruitment for contract killings and other crimes due to their vulnerability and the legal loopholes in the Colombian legal and criminal system to prosecute their cases. Finding the masterminds is key to finally determining whether the crime occurred for political or purely criminal reasons. According to a report by Noticias Caracol, the prosecutor investigating one of the detainees stated in a hearing that the attack may have occurred "because he is a senator and is campaigning politically as a pre-candidate for the presidency". This is a hypothesis that has not been officially confirmed by the authorities. Carlos Fernando Triana, from the National Police, said that "within the framework of the investigation, everything indicates that the Second Marquetalia is very likely part of this network in terms of the determiners, but that is under investigation." La Segunda Marquetalia is one of the largest FARC dissidents that took up arms again after the peace agreement between the government and this guerrilla in 2016. Neither this armed group, nor any other, has claimed any link to the attack against Uribe Turbay.