BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — It’s enough to make a candy junkie give up the sweet stuff forever.
A self-declared chocolate addict has been sentenced to five months in one of Colombia’s harshest prisons for swiping $8 worth of candy bars.
Luis Augusto Mora was caught stealing two boxes of locally made Jumbo bars at a Bogota supermarket. After confessing, Mora was sentenced to La Picota prison, home to some of the country’s most hardened criminals and drug-traffickers.
The tough punishment has caught the attention of President Juan Manuel Santos. In a radio interview Tuesday he said that misdemeanors like Mora’s shouldn’t waste prosecutors’ time and effort.
Meanwhile, prosecutors have distributed a statement saying the chocolate thief is expressing regret.
Mora says he’ll “never again touch a chocolate in my life.”
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