Dr. Luis Williams Pollo Rivera is a surgeon who specializes in traumatology and orthopedics in Peru.  He is currently serving a ten-year prison sentence in Peru for allegedly rendering support to a subversive organization "through his medical knowledge."  On August 26, 2003, Dr. Rivera was arrested and physically carried out of a local hospital by members of the National Intelligence Directorate (DIRIN), where he was working in Andahuaylas, Peru.  He was accused of providing medical treatment to members of the Communist Party of Peru ("Shining Path" or "PCP-SL" or "Sendero Luminoso"). 

Previously, on November 4, 1992, he was accused of a similar offense and within weeks had been given a life sentence for treason in a military tribunal with masked ("faceless") judges after having been given only ten minutes to present his defense.  The Shining Path member who had alleged Dr. Rivera provided him with medical treatment later affirmed in writing the police pressured him in to making a false accusation.  As a result, a civilian court later acquitted Dr. Rivera on all charges in 1994 and this decision was later affirmed by the Supreme Court of Peru in 1996.

In 2004, however, Dr. Rivera was rearrested, convicted, and sentenced to ten-years imprisonment by the National Terrorism Chamber.  This conviction was later upheld by the Supreme Court of Peru.  At trial, no evidence was presented by the Government that Dr. Rivera had ever associated with the Shining Path, spoken out against the Peruvian government, or advocated violence.  The only evidence presented were statements by several Shining Path members, obtained under interrogation, that he had provided them with medical treatment between 1989-1991. These claims were strenuously denied by Dr. Rivera and several witnesses backed his version of events.

Whether Dr. Rivera provided this treatment, however, is immaterial.  The act of providing medical treatment does not violate Peruvian or international law.  On the contrary, doctors have an obligation to help the injured, regardless of their patients' political affiliation, beliefs, or actions.  In fact, the Peruvian government's prosecution of Dr. Rivera is a clear violation of international law.  In 2004, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in De La Cruz Flores v. Peru reiterated the international prohibition on criminalizing medical acts.  In that case, Peru was ordered to release a doctor who had been detained for allegedly aiding a terrorist group by administering needed medical treatment. 

Dr. Rivera is currently imprisoned at Miguel Castro prison in Lima, Peru.  He is in very poor health.  He suffers from diabetes mellitus with progressive loss of vision from an unspecified paralytic syndrome, and secondary hypertension.  He also suffers from spinal injuries resulting from torture during his first imprisonment, and he has since required a wheelchair.  Freedom Now is working with Dr. Rivera's Peruvian counsel, Carolina Loayza Tamayo, a professor at the Universidad de Lima, who is representing him before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.  His case has already been deemed admissible by the Commission.

On May 31, 2010, Freedom Now filed a petition to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention seeking an opinion that his ongoing imprisonment is a violation of international law.

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