Guatemalan Anti-Corruption Lawyer Shot Dead

Juan Francisco Solórzano Foppa, a prominent Guatemalan anti-corruption lawyer and former head of the country’s tax authority, was shot and killed on Saturday, October 17, at a sports complex in Guatemala City.

Solórzano Foppa, 43, was attacked at the Campo Marte sports complex, where he was coaching a football team, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).

Reuters reported that he was shot by two men while visiting the sports center. HRW said another man, identified by authorities as Gustavo Adolfo Aguilar Gamarro, was also killed.

Police detained two men shortly after the attack and seized a carbine-style firearm and a motorcycle. HRW later said prosecutors found no evidence linking the two men to the attack, and that a judge ordered their release. No one has been publicly identified as responsible.

President Bernardo Arévalo condemned the killing on X. “I strongly condemn the cowardly murder of former prosecutor Juan Francisco Solorzano Foppa. Both the direct perpetrators and those who ordered the crime must face the full weight of the law,” Arévalo said.

He said he had instructed his government to coordinate with the authorities to solve the crime.

Solórzano Foppa was a former prosecutor who led the Criminal Investigations Directorate in the Public Prosecutor’s Office and then ran Guatemala’s tax agency, the Superintendency of Tax Administration (SAT), from 2016 to 2018. Reuters said he helped prosecute dozens of powerful business figures and recover unpaid taxes. HRW said his work included supporting the “La Línea” case, which led to the resignation of then-President Otto Pérez Molina in 2015.