• Ollanta Humala and his wife, Nadine Heredia, sentenced to 15 years in prison for money laundering.
• The couple received illegal contributions from Odebrecht and the Venezuelan government for campaign financing.
• Humala becomes the third former Peruvian president imprisoned over corruption related to Odebrecht.
• Heredia fled to Brazil seeking asylum following the verdict.
• The trial has exposed widespread political corruption linked to multiple former presidents.

A Peruvian court has sentenced former president Ollanta Humala and his wife Nadine Heredia to 15 years in prison for money laundering related to funds received from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht. The National Superior Court found that they received around $3 million in illegal contributions for his electoral campaigns in 2006 and 2011, alongside additional funds from the Venezuelan government under Hugo Chávez, according to SCMP.

Both Humala and Heredia were previously held in pretrial detention from 2017 to 2018 as part of the investigation, which commenced in 2015, shortly before Odebrecht's 2016 admission of extensive bribery practices across Latin America. Prosecutors had requested harsher penalties of 20 years for Humala and 26.5 years for Heredia, according to LATimes.

Following the verdict, Heredia fled to the Brazilian Embassy seeking asylum, while Humala was taken into custody immediately. The Brazilian government granted her asylum, allowing her and their son to travel on an official plane to Brazil. Her situation reflects the political turmoil surrounding former leaders linked to the Odebrecht scandal, as reported by BBC.

This ruling designates Humala as the third former Peruvian president to be imprisoned for corruption-related charges in the last two decades, following Alejandro Toledo and Alberto Fujimori. The pervasive issue of corruption linked to Odebrecht affects many political figures in Peru, as highlighted by Al Jazeera.