Abimael Guzmán Manuel Rubén Abimael Guzmán Reynoso ( ; born 3 December 1934 ) , also known by the nom de guerre Presidente Gonzalo ( ) , a former professor of philosophy , was the leader of the Shining Path during the Maoist insurgency known as the internal conflict in Peru . Shining Path had been active in Peru since the late 1970s and began what it called " the armed struggle " on 17 May 1980 . Wanted on charges of terrorism and treason , Guzmán was captured by the Peruvian government in 1992 and sentenced to life imprisonment . He is currently incarcerated at the Callao naval base , near the city of Lima , Peru . While the activity of the insurgency increased shortly after Guzmán ' s capture , it has declined in the years following . It has been criticized for its violence against peasants , trade union organizers , and elected officials , which were deemed by the group to be collaborating with the Peruvian state . Shining Path is on the U . S . Department of State ' s " Designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations " list . The European Union , and Peru likewise describe Shining Path as a terrorist group and prohibit providing funding or other financial support . Early life . Guzmán was born in Mollendo , a port town in the province of Islay , in the region of Arequipa , about south of Lima . He was the illegitimate son of a well - off merchant , the winner of the national lottery who had six children by three different women . Guzmán ' s mother , Berenice Reynoso , died when he was only five years old . From 1939 to 1946 Guzmán lived with his mother ' s family . After 1947 he lived with his father and his father ' s wife in the city of Arequipa , where he studied at Colegio De La Salle , a private Catholic secondary school . At the age of 19 he became a student at the Social Studies department of San Agustín National University , in Arequipa . His classmates at the university later described him as shy , disciplined , obsessive , and ascetic . Increasingly attracted by Marxism , his political thinking was influenced by the book " Seven Essays on the Interpretation of the Peruvian Reality " of José Carlos Mariátegui , the founder of the Communist Party of Peru . At Arequipa , Guzmán completed bachelor degrees in philosophy and law . His dissertations were entitled " The Kantian Theory of Space " and " The Bourgeois Democratic State " . In 1962 , Guzmán was recruited as a professor of philosophy by the rector of San Cristóbal of Huamanga University in Ayacucho , a city in the central Peruvian Andes . The rector was Dr . Efraín Morote Best , an anthropologist who some believe later became the true intellectual leader of the " Shining Path movement . " Encouraged by Morote , Guzmán studied Quechua , the language spoken by Peru ' s indigenous population , and became increasingly active in left - wing political circles . He attracted several like - minded young academics committed to bringing about revolution in Peru . Guzmán was arrested twice during the 1970s because of his participation in violent riots in the city of Arequipa against the government of presidents Velasco Alvarado and Belaunde Terry . He visited the People ' s Republic of China for the first time in 1965 . After serving as the head of personnel for San Cristóbal of Huamanga University , Guzmán left the institution in the mid - 1970s and went underground . In the 1960s , the Peruvian Communist Party splintered over ideological and personal disputes . Guzmán , who had taken a pro - Chinese rather than pro - Soviet line , emerged as the leader of the faction which came to be known as the " Shining Path " ( Mariátegui wrote once : " Marxism – Leninism is the shining path of the future " ) . Guzmán adopted the " nom de guerre " Presidente Gonzalo and began advocating a peasant - led revolution on the Maoist model . His followers declared Guzmán , who cultivated anonymity , to be the " Fourth Sword of Communism " ( after Marx , Lenin , and Mao ) . In his political declarations , Guzmán praised Mao ' s development of Lenin ' s thesis regarding the role of imperialism in propping up the bourgeois capitalist system . He claimed that imperialism ultimately " creates disruption and is unsuccessful , and it will end up in ruins in the next 50 to 100 years " . Guzmán applied this criticism not only to U . S . imperialism , but also to what he termed the " social - imperialism " of the Soviet Union . In February 1964 he married Augusta la Torre , who died under unclear circumstances in 1989 . It has been rumored that she was murdered by Elena Iparraguirre , Guzmán ' s lover , with his complicity . Both have refused to talk about La Torre ' s fate since their imprisonment . In the fall of 2006 , while in prison , Guzmán proposed to Iparraguirre , one of his long - time lieutenants who is also serving a life sentence in a separate prison . After fighting for the permission to marry with a hunger strike , the couple wed in late August 2010 . The " People ' s War " . The Shining Path movement was at first largely circumscribed to academic circles in Peruvian universities . In the late 1970s , however , the movement developed into a guerrilla group centered around Ayacucho . In May 1980 , the group launched its war against the government of Perú by burning the ballot boxes in Chuschi , a village near Ayacucho , in an effort to disrupt the first democratic elections in the country since 1964 . Shining Path eventually grew to control vast rural territories in central and southern Peru and achieved a presence even in the outskirts of Lima , where it staged numerous attacks . The purpose of Shining Path ' s campaign was to demoralize and undermine the government of Perú in order to create a situation conducive to a violent coup which would put its leaders in power . The Shining Path targeted not only the army and police , but also government employees at all levels , other leftist militants such as members of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement ( MRTA ) , workers who did not participate in the strikes organized by the group , peasants who cooperated with the government in any way ( including by voting in democratic elections ) , and ordinary middle - class inhabitants of Perú ' s main cities . The Truth and Reconciliation Commission later estimated that the resulting conflict led to the deaths of some seventy thousand people , approximately half of them at the hands of the Shining Path and a third at the hands of the state . Initially Guzmán attempted to win over the support of citizens by punishing corrupt government officials and other unpopular leaders . However , Shining Path ' s increasingly brutal methods together with strictly imposed curfews , the prohibition of alcohol and an overall sense of insecurity and fear lead to an increased popular reaction against the communist party . Eventually Guzmán ' s plan backfired as rural militia or " rondas " rallied support for the military against Shining Path . The very peasants Guzmán claimed to defend had turned against the Shining Path . This resulted in a cyclical state of violence in which Maoist guerillas embarked in ruthless punitive expeditions against Peruvian civilians living in the Andean region . In 1983 , 69 people ( including women and children ) from the highland town of Lucanamarca were tortured and murdered by the Shining Path in what became known as the Lucanamarca massacre . Guzmán ' s image as a dispassionate murderer became widespread after he moved against the city of Lima . After a series of bombings and selective assassinations the whole nation was shocked in 1992 when a car bomb exploded in one of Lima ' s busiest commercial districts on Tarata street , thus causing many casualties and enormous material losses . To this day , Guzmán denies responsibility for the Tarata bombing by claiming that it was a " deplorable mistake . " The movement promoted the writings of Guzmán , called " Gonzalo Thought " , a new " theoretical understanding " that built upon Marxism , Leninism , and Maoism whereby he declared Maoism as a " third and higher stage of Marxism , " having defined Maoism as " people ' s war . " In 1989 , Guzmán declared that the Shining Path ( which he referred to as the " Communist Party of Peru " ) had progressed from waging a people ' s war to waging a " war of movements . " He further argued that this was a step towards achieving " strategic equilibrium " in the near future , based on Maoist theories of waging people ' s war . Guzmán claimed that such an equilibrium would manifest itself by ungovernability under the " old order . " When that moment arrived , Guzmán believed that Shining Path would be ready to move on to its " strategic offensive " . Theodore Dalrymple has written that " the worst brutality I ever saw was that committed by Sendero Luminoso ( Shining Path ) in Peru , in the days when it seemed possible that it might come to power . If it had , I think its massacres would have dwarfed those of the Khmer Rouge . As a doctor , I am accustomed to unpleasant sights , but nothing prepared me for what I saw in Ayacucho , where Sendero first developed under the sway of a professor of philosophy , Abimael Guzmán . " Capture . In 1992 , during the first administration of President Alberto Fujimori , the National Directorate Against Terrorism ( DIRCOTE ) began casing several residences in Lima because agents suspected that terrorists were using them as safehouses . One of those residences , in the upper - class neighborhood of Surco , had been operating as a ballet studio . The DIRCOTE operatives routinely searched the garbage taken out from the house . The house was supposedly inhabited by only one person , the dance teacher Maritza Garrido Lecca , but it was soon noticed that the household produced more garbage than one person could account for . Furthermore , agents found discarded tubes of cream for the treatment of psoriasis , an ailment that Guzmán was known to have . On September 12 , 1992 , an elite unit of the DIRCOTE raided the Surco residence . On the second floor of the house , they found and arrested Guzmán and eight others , including Laura Zambrano and Elena Iparraguirre , Guzmán ' s female companion . At the time of capture , the police seized Guzmán ' s computer , in which they found a very detailed register of his armed forces and the weapons each regiment , militia and support base had in each region of the country . Guzmán had recorded that , in 1990 , the Shining Path had 23 , 430 members armed with approximately 235 revolvers , 500 rifles and 300 other items of military hardware such as grenade s . The Shining Path remained active after Guzman ' s arrest . Trial and imprisonment . Guzmán was tried by a court of hooded military judges under provisions of Articles 15 & 16 of Law 25475 adopted by Fujimori ' s government in May 1992 after April ' s constitutional crisis . The idea of this was to protect the judges ' lives for Shining Path was remembered for brutal retaliation against judges who convicted their members . After a three - day trial , Guzmán was sentenced to life imprisonment and incarcerated at Maximum Security Reclusion Center , in the naval base of Callao , the port of Lima , where he currently remains . Subsequently , he is said to have negotiated with a presidential advisor at the time , Vladimiro Montesinos , in order to receive some benefits in exchange for helping the Peruvian government put an end to the Shining Path ' s militant activities . Guzmán appeared several times on Peruvian television and on October 1 , 1993 he publicly declared " peace " with the Peruvian government . This declaration split the Shining Path and raised questions about the organization ' s future . About 6 , 000 guerrillas within the party accepted it as a sign of defeat and surrendered . Others held that it was either a forgery or an insincere statement made under duress . Although there is little doubt that Guzmán was indeed the leader of the Shining Path , more than 5 , 000 individuals presented an appeal to Peru ' s Constitutional Court in 2003 asking that the verdicts against more than 1800 other prisoners convicted of terrorism , including Guzmán , be voided . The court agreed , declaring that the military trials had been unconstitutional and ordering new trials before civilian courts . The new trials began in 2003 . Since then , more than 400 prisoners who had been found guilty by military courts have been freed . Guzmán ' s re - trial was scheduled to begin on 5 November 2004 . The international press was held in a sound - proof chamber and all media was banned from observing the trial after the Shining Path cadre turned their backs on the judges and delivered a revolutionary salute to the media gallery . The only words Guzmán spoke in the presence of the international press were " Long live the Communist Party of Peru ! Glory to Marxism – Leninism – Maoism ! Glory to the Peruvian people ! Long live the heroes of the people ’ s war ! " After he made this statement , the courtroom microphones were silenced and the press was unable to hear any of the proceedings that followed . The trial resumed on 12 November . No reporters were allowed to observe the new proceedings but two more of the judges subsequently recused themselves . Guzmán ' s third trial began in September 2005 and was opened and closed amid a media blackout . No reporters were allowed to attend . On 13 October 2006 , Guzmán was sentenced to life in prison on charges of aggravated terrorism and murder . At his sentencing , three judges listed the aforementioned charges in a verdict that lasted more than six hours . He is currently incarcerated in aforementioned Callao prison . His neighbours include Víctor Polay , leader of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement , and , ironically , Vladimiro Montesinos , the former head of the National Intelligence Service who supervised the construction of the prison served under the ( now also imprisoned ) President Alberto Fujimori .