::"False positives" scandal

Colombia::military    Cases::false    Title::author    Killings::killed    Which::civilian    Courts::carried

The "false positives" scandal (Escándalo de los falsos positivos in Spanish) was a series of murders in Colombia, part of the ongoing armed conflict in that country between the government and guerrilla forces of the FARC and the ELN. Members of the military had poor or mentally impaired civilians lured to remote parts of the country with offers of work, killed them, and presented them to authorities as guerrilleros killed in battle, in an effort to inflate body counts and receive promotions or other benefits.<ref name=lat/>

As of June 2012, a total of 3,350 such cases have been investigated in all parts of the country and verdicts have been reached in 170 cases. Human rights groups have charged that the judicial cases progressed too slowly.<ref name=lat/>

The name of the scandal refers to the technical term of "false positive" which describes a test falsely detecting a condition that is not present.

"False positives" scandal sections
Intro  2008 Soacha case  Other cases  UN investigation  Recent developments  References  External links  

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