Office of the Attorney General
Fiscalía General de la Nación
Agency overview
FormedJuly 6, 1991 (1991-07-06)
HeadquartersDiagonal 22B 52-01
(Ciudad Salitre),
Bogotá, Colombia
Annual budgetCOP$1,437,526,644,588
(est. 2010)[1]
Agency executives
  • Francisco Barbosa, Attorney General
  • Martha Janeth Mancera, Deputy Attorney General
Child agency
Websitewww.fiscalia.gov.co

The Office of the Attorney General of Colombia (Spanish: Fiscalía General de la Nación; literally "General Prosecutorial Office of the Nation") is the Colombian institution part of the Colombian judicial branch of Government with administrative autonomy designed to prosecute offenders, investigate crimes, review judicial processes and accuse penal law infractions against judges and courts of justice.[2] The Office of the Attorney General was created by the Colombian Constitution of 1991 and began operating on July 1, 1992.

An investigative process is initiated either by the institutions' own initiative or after a denouncer has made authorities aware of the case in a police station or in a Quick Reaction Unit of the Attorney General's Office.

Attorney General

Election process

The attorney general is elected by Colombian Supreme Court out of a ternary presented by the president for a period of four years. To cast the final vote, the Supreme Court of Justice must meet a quorum of 16 out of the possible 23 votes, i.e. two thirds of the votes.

List of attorneys general

Order Name Years in office
1st Gustavo de Greiff Restrepo 1 April 1992 – 17 August 1994
2nd Alfonso Valdivieso Sarmiento 18 August 1994 – 8 May 1997
3rd Alfonso Gómez Méndez 3 July 1997 – 3 July 2001
4th Luis Camilo Osorio Isaza 1 August 2001 – 1 August 2005
5th Mario Germán Iguarán Arana 1 August 2005 – 1 August 2009
6th ad interim Guillermo Mendoza Diago 1 August 2009 – 12 January 2011
7th Viviane Morales Hoyos 12 January 2011 – 6 March 2012
8th Martha Lucía Zamora Ávila 6 March 2012 – 29 March 2012
9th Eduardo Montealegre Lynett 29 March 2012 – 28 March 2016
10th ad interim Jorge Fernando Perdomo 29 March 2016 – 1 August 2016
11th Néstor Humberto Martínez 1 August 2016 – 15 May 2019
12th Fabio Espitia Garzón 17 May 2019 – 12 February 2020
13th Francisco Barbosa Delgado 13 February 2020 – present

History

Former attorney general Luis Camilo Osorio, whose four-year term ran from 2001 to 2005, was criticized by Human Rights Watch. They accused him of undermining investigations into human rights violations by retiring or forcing the resignation of several investigators.[3]

In November 2023, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project joined with more than 40 media partners including Cerosetenta / 070, Vorágine, the Centro Latinoamericano de Investigación Periodística (CLIP) and Distributed Denial of Secrets and journalists in 23 countries and territories for the largest investigative project on organized crime to originate in Latin America, producing the 'NarcoFiles' report. The investigation was based on more than seven million emails from the Colombian prosecutor’s office which had been hacked by Guacamaya, including correspondence with embassies and authorities around the world. The files dated from 2001-2022 and included audio clips, PDFs, spreadsheets, and calendars.[4][5] The investigation revealed new details about the global drug trade and over 44 tons of "controlled deliveries" carried out to infiltrate the drug trade[6][7] and how criminals corrupt politicians, bankers, accountants, lawyers, law enforcement agents, hackers, logistics experts, and journalists in order to use logistical, financial, and digital infrastructures.[8]

References

  1. ↑ Ley de Presupuesto General de la Nación 2010 (PDF), Ministry of Finance and Public Credit, 2010, pp. 50–51, retrieved 2010-11-23
  2. ↑ "Identidad Corporativa" (in Spanish). Office of the Attorney General of Colombia. Retrieved 2008-11-29.
  3. ↑ "Colombia: Attorney General Undermines Human Rights Investigations". Human Rights Watch. 2002-10-07. Retrieved 2008-11-29.
  4. ↑ OCCRP. "What Is 'NarcoFiles: The New Criminal Order'? Everything You Need To Know". OCCRP. Retrieved 2023-12-24.
  5. ↑ Project, Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting. "NarcoFiles: The New Criminal Order". OCCRP. Retrieved 2023-12-24.
  6. ↑ "The Highway to Europe: Inside a Global Drug Collaboration - OCCRP". The Highway to Europe: Inside a Global Drug Collaboration - OCCRP. Retrieved 2023-12-24.
  7. ↑ Vélez (CLIP-OCCRP), Kevin G. Hall (OCCRP), Nathan Jaccard (OCCRP), Jacqueline Charles (Miami Herald), and Juanita. "Colombian Leak Gives Rare Glimpse Into Secretive World of 'Controlled' Drug Deliveries". OCCRP. Retrieved 2023-12-24.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  8. ↑ Radu, Paul. "The Transnational Public Enemy". OCCRP. Retrieved 2023-12-24.

4°38′20″N 74°5′58″W / 4.63889°N 74.09944°W / 4.63889; -74.09944

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