The Attorney General’s Office prosecuted Norberto de Jesús Villa Rivera and Sebastián Villa Giraldo who, apparently, engaged in illegal mining activities, in search of gold in the Risaralda River as it passes through the so-called Río Arriba in the municipality of Mistrató, an area considered a forest reserve.
A prosecutor appointed to the branch office of Risaralda (Seccional Risaralda) charged the defendants with illegal exploitation of mining deposits and other materials. They did not plead guilty to the charges.
Both people were arrested on January 28 in the rural area of Río Arriba (Mistrató), by officers of the Technical Investigative Corps (Cuerpo Técnico de Investigación CTI), the National Police and the National Army.
The Attorney General’s Office determined that the activities in which Villa Rivera and Villa Giraldo were prosecuted were carried out without a mining title or environmental license. Experts determined that there were serious environmental damages to the ecosystem, especially to Risaralda river, the main waterway in the region.
The Office of the Attorney General makes this information public for reasons of general interest.
The information contained in this press release corresponds to the narration of the objective news provided by the officials in charge of carrying out criminal investigations within the Office of the Attorney General. By the time this communication is disclosed, the legal status of the people mentioned is still pending to be resolved by the competent judicial authority, always under the presumption of innocence contemplated by Article 29 of the Political Constitution and Article 7 of Law 906 of 2004.