(IPYS/IFEX) – On 22 March 2007, Judge Sonia Salvador Ludeña, of the Sixth Criminal Court of Lima (Sexto Juzgado Penal de Lima), sentenced the journalist and humourist Nicolás Yerovi to a suspended sentence of four years and a fine of 3.400 nuevos soles (approx. US$ 1,100), for plagiarizing his own novel. The suit was filed […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – On 22 March 2007, Judge Sonia Salvador Ludeña, of the Sixth Criminal Court of Lima (Sexto Juzgado Penal de Lima), sentenced the journalist and humourist Nicolás Yerovi to a suspended sentence of four years and a fine of 3.400 nuevos soles (approx. US$ 1,100), for plagiarizing his own novel.
The suit was filed in 1999. According to Yerovi, the charge was laid in retaliation for his criticism of former president Alberto Fujimori and his former adviser Vladimiro Montesinos, which were published as political satire in the newspaper “La República” and the humorous weekly “Monos y Monadas”. Fujimori and Montesinos made use of the State’s institutions to harass those who criticized them. The journalist had to appear in court on 22 December 2006. If he had failed to appear, a warrant for his arrest would have been issued and he would have been declared a “suspect at large.”
The case goes back to 1999, when Yerovi and the publishing house Peisa filed an accusation of plagiarism against Alberto Álvarez Calderón with the National Institute for the Protection for Intellectual Property (Instituto Nacional de Defensa de la Competencia y de la Protección de la Propiedad Intelectual, INDECOPI), accusing him of having plagiarised from the novel “Más Allá del Aroma”, written by Yerovi. Álvarez admitted to this misdemeanour on 5 February 1999 and pledged not to publish or market the book. A week later, however, INDECOPI named Yerovi as the plagiarizer, forbade him to publish the novel and initiated legal proceedings against him.
Yerovi’s lawyer has appealed the sentence with the High Court (Sala Superior de Justicia).
