Collared by the Cops

By tradition, the life story of the Latin American dictator goes something like this: win power, steal, flee (aided by the hallowed tradition of "political asylum"), spend and enjoy. The story almost never includes: return home, face the music. Last week, in a startling change in the familiar pattern, the democratic government of Colombia stood up to a brazen former strongman and made him answer for his actions.

From his exile in the Canary Islands, ex-Dictator Gustavo Rojas Pinilla had flown home to Bogota, gambling that the fledgling government would never dare throw a former army boss in jail. He misjudged his opponents. While Rojas held court to a handful of admirers in the town house of a friend, Colombia's Senate calmly went ahead drafting indictments for corruption. One well-documented case revolved around Rojas' intervention to clear one of his cronies who was caught smuggling cattle into the country. The others were straight from bank and government records: that Rojas and his friends, with only a hint of collateral, used influence to obtain $4,286,170 in loans; that the Rojas family land company, starting with nothing but paper capital, pulled off a $148,000 profit within five months--and never paid a penny in taxes.

Last week the Senate summoned Rojas to appear and defend himself. In answer, Rojas issued a defiant communique: "I cannot recognize this farce, conceived in hate, vengeance and vain haughtiness." As the hour of his appointment with the Senate passed, a few followers in the town house tried to convince Rojas that the glorious days of power would return. "Mi general," shouted one, "the people are with you." Rojas smiled, nodded and hugged himself: "I am enveloped in the constitution."

A few days later President Alberto Lleras Camargo called Rojas' bluff. Troops and cops rumbled up in tanks and halftracks, sealed off a 60-block area around Roias' residence. A police colonel and a squad of soldiers hustled the ex-dictator off to a nearby office building, where a Senate committee was meeting to draw up the corruption indictments. After a two-hour grilling, the witness went home and to bed.

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