Guatemalan lawmaker Julio César Portillo Paz died after gunmen attacked his convoy in Zacapa, killing three police officers assigned to protect him.
Gunmen opened fire on Guatemalan lawmaker Julio César Portillo Paz’s convoy Friday, November 6, killing three police officers assigned to protect him. Portillo survived the attack but died that night at the Regional Hospital of Zacapa. He was 35 and represented Zacapa in Guatemala’s Congress.
The shooting took place around 5:30 p.m. at kilometer 137 of the Atlantic Highway in Río Hondo, across from a National Civil Police substation. Guatemala’s Interior Ministry said the officers died while trying to repel a direct attack on the lawmaker. Police identified them as Jorge Paau Xicol, Erick Armides Ramos Osorio and Fernando Reyes Aldana. Two were traveling on a motorcycle when the shooting began, according to the departmental firefighters’.
Portillo reached the hospital at 5:45 p.m. with multiple gunshot wounds. Doctors operated and moved him to intensive care. A military helicopter arrived to take him to Guatemala City, but his injuries were too severe for the transfer, the Zacapa departmental government said. Hospital director Luis Alberto Nájera García said Portillo died at 9:58 p.m. Guatemala’s forensic institute separately confirmed that gunshot wounds caused his death.
By Saturday, prosecutors had recovered more than 40 pieces of ballistic evidence of different calibers and were still examining the scene and vehicles. Congress condemned the attack and called for a prompt, impartial investigation. President Bernardo Arévalo directed security forces to assist prosecutors. Authorities had not publicly named suspects or disclosed a motive in the reporting reviewed.
Portillo had reported threats and extortion well before the shooting. There have been reports that a 2024 risk assessment led authorities to increase his police detail from two to six officers for six months. He had told authorities unknown people were following or watching members of his family. The available accounts do not connect those earlier reports to Friday’s attack.
Elected for the 2024–2028 term on the Cabal ticket, Portillo served as vice chair of the food security and foreign affairs committees and as secretary of the Indigenous Peoples Committee. Cabal moved to expel him in April 2025 after a Zacapa mayor accused him of demanding commissions in exchange for municipal projects. Portillo denied the allegations. Anti-corruption prosecutors later sought to lift his immunity to investigate; that request was not a conviction, and no evidence reviewed links the allegations to his killing.
