Disgraced former Ecuadorian leader Lenín Moreno was hit with a five-year prison sentence Friday — to be served from his own home — after judges found he pocketed dirty money from a Chinese construction giant.
The 73-year-old, paralysed since a 1998 shooting, sat through the verdict as a Quito tribunal branded him guilty of bribery over the $2 billion Coca Codo Sinclair dam. Judges didn’t stop at prison time: Moreno was slapped with a lifetime ban from public office, and the court demanded over $163 million in reparations from him and 19 co-defendants — including his own wife and daughter.
Furious and defiant, Moreno swore he never touched “a single cent” of Sinohydro’s cash and pointed the finger squarely at his old boss-turned-enemy Rafael Correa, accusing him of plotting payback from his comfortable exile in Belgium.
His lawyers are already gearing up for an appeal — but for now, Ecuador’s once-untouchable president is a convicted man.
