The prosecution maintains that the former president deserves punishment for his failed attempt to dissolve the opposing Parliament and intervene in the justice body on December 7th, 2022, which failed due to lack of military and police support. That same day he was arrested by the police when he was heading to the Mexican Embassy to seek asylum and to request protection for his family, according to Castillo himself.

Castillo’s former prime minister Betssy Chávez, who has been in prison since June 2023; his adviser, Aníbal Torres; his Interior Minister, Willy Huerta, currently on parole; General Manuel Lozada; Commander Jesús Venero; and Lieutenant Eder Infanzón, all of whom are former officers of the National Police and accused of the same charge, and also on parole, are being tried as accomplices or co-authors along with Castillo.

The Prosecutor’s Office is requesting 25 years in prison for the other defendants, except for Torres, for whom it is requesting 15 years of imprisonment.

The defenders of the former ruler have argumented that according to the penal code, rebellion is only committed with a collective armed uprising, which did not occur, while the Prosecutor’s Office maintains that Castillo gave the Armed Forces the order for the coup.

The former Minister of Women in Castillo’s administration for some months, Anahí Durand, maintains that the accused did not carry out a coup d’état, since he had no military or police support, but rather a desperate action in the face of the siege of the political and media opposition, eager to remove him. She claims that, on the contrary, current president Dina Boluarte conspired against Castillo together with the opposition Congress, assumed the presidency elected by the Parliament opposition-majority and since then has exercised a government contrary to that of her predecessor.

The succession gave rise to social protests that left fifty civilian deaths.

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