Paola Margot UGAZ CRUZ
Investigative journalist, editor and writer Paola Ugaz continued to face judicial harassment in 2025, in relation to an ongoing investigation for alleged ‘illicit enrichment’ opened in 2023.
In January 2025, the Pope dissolved the Sodalicio de Vida movement in January 2025, after an investigation uncovered sexual abuses by its founder, financial mismanagement by its leaders and spiritual abuses by its top members. The Pope based his decision on the research of journalists Paola Ugaz and Pedro Salinas.
In a moving letter dated June 2025, Pope Leo XIV recognized Ugaz’s pathbreaking journalism, stating ‘The truth does not belong to anyone—it is the responsibility of everyone to seek it, preserve it, and serve it’. In June 2025, the statement was read at the premiere of Proyecto Ugaz, a play honouring the courage of whistleblowers and journalists that was inspired by Ugaz’s instrumental role in exposing systemic abuses that led to the Vatican’s intervention.
Since 2018, Ugaz has faced a campaign of harassment, threats and at least five defamation lawsuits, including allegations of crimes, due to her investigations into corruption as well as into physical, psychological and sexual abuse within the Peruvian religious organization Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, which she has conducted with Pedro Salinas since 2010. Ugaz began to receive complaints and lawsuits following the announcement she was publishing a new book about the group’s financial management. PEN International has campaigned for an end to her harassment over several years (see Case Lists 2020 – 2025).
Investigative journalist, editor and writer Paola Ugaz, born in 1974, is the co-author, along with Pedro Salinas, of the book Mitad monjes, mitad soldados (Half Monks, Half Soldiers) which uncovered a huge scandal within Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana. A correspondent for the Spanish newspaper ABC, she was one of the recipients of the International Women in Media Awards in 2021. She was awarded the Latin American Studies Association Media award in 2024.