A Malian court on Friday sentenced former domestic intelligence chief Kassoum Goita to 15 years in prison after convicting him of conspiring against the government.
The verdict followed a 10-day trial during which Goita publicly accused Mali’s military authorities of corruption, embezzlement and torturing him while he was in detention.
Goita had faced charges including attempting to stage a coup and undermining state institutions. He was ultimately convicted of criminal conspiracy and plotting against the government, according to Agence France-Presse.
He denied all charges during the trial, which also involved five other defendants.
Goita was among the military officers who helped overthrow elected president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in an August 2020 coup led by Colonel Assimi Goita. Despite sharing the same surname, the two men are not related.
Following international pressure, the military initially transferred power to a civilian-led transitional administration tasked with restoring democratic rule. Kassoum Goita was appointed head of the domestic intelligence service under that government.
He was later dismissed after Assimi Goita removed the transitional leadership in a second coup in 2021 and installed himself as interim president.
“We were not surprised by the ruling,” one of Goita’s defence lawyers said. “We intend to exhaust all available legal avenues of appeal in the country before taking the case to other bodies.”