Overview
- Eleven soldiers were sentenced to 34 years for forced disappearance, while five who cooperated with prosecutors received two-and-a-half-year terms.
- The defendants were acquitted of killing the boys, as evidence and testimonies centered on abuse and abandonment rather than direct homicide.
- Witness accounts described beatings, mock executions, forced stripping, and the boys being left in the remote Taura area that the judge called dangerous and desolate.
- The victims, ages 11 to 15, disappeared in Guayaquil on December 8, 2024, and authorities later identified their charred remains found on December 31.
- The ruling has intensified scrutiny of President Daniel Noboa’s Phoenix Plan, and prosecutors say they are also seeking convictions in a separate alleged extrajudicial-execution case in Santa Elena.