JUAN CARLOS LLORCA
  Associated Press

  GUATEMALA CITY - A Guatemalan court on Wednesday sentenced 16 former members of an elite anti-drug force to 25 years in prison for leading a bloody
  raid on a corn-growing village last year.

  All defendants were found guilty of using their position of authority to commit murder when they ordered or participated in the storming of Chocon, 125
  miles northeast of Guatemala City, the capital.

  During the raid, authorities shot and killed two locals and held most of the rest of the town hostage for two days. Agents left after making three arrests -
  even though house-to-house searches failed to result in a single drug seizure.

  Police commanders fired all of the defendants before they went to trial and dissolved the anti-narcotics unit at the end of last year. The case still drew
  sharp criticism from Guatemala's human rights ombudsman and the United Nations Mission to Guatemala, however.

  U.S. officials also said the violent raid played a role in Washington's decision to strip Guatemala of its drug certification in January, costing this country U.S.
  aid for its anti-drugs programs.

  Defense attorneys said they would appeal Wednesday's sentences.

  "This was politics," said lawyer Boanerges Chavez. The rulings "were manipulated by the authorities, who condemned innocent people who were only
  trying to capture drug dealers that operated in that area."

  Witnesses of the Chocon raid said agents shot and killed two suspected drug dealers when the men tried to run away.

  Other officers then made everyone lie face-down in the street. Yelling "hand over the drugs," they searched dozens of men, women and children for more
  than an hour, but found nothing.

  The raid continued with officers breaking into and ransacking homes. Eventually authorities set up shop in a municipal building and spent the next two days
  interrogating dozens of people and making detailed lists of their belongings.