Also known as El Chigüín—"The little child”—Somoza Portocarrero had been the heir apparent to the Somoza family regime prior to the ouster of his father by the Marxist Sandinistas in 1979.
[3][5] He played an active role in the armed forces during the Sandinista insurrection, and the National Guard unit which he commanded "was accused of widespread human rights violations in the final days of the civil war.
"[4] Like all combatants during the 1979-1989 period, Somoza Portocarrero was included against his wishes in the Blanket Amnesty demanded by the FSLN from incoming President Violeta Chamorro in 1990.
In early 1980, the new Sandinista government formally accused Somoza Portocarrero of masterminding the 1978 assassination of opposition journalist Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal,[7] and a June 1981 trial that convicted nine people of the crime implicated him but did not go as far as naming him as a defendant in absentia.
[8] In 1980, Sandinista officials also issued a warrant for Somoza Portocarrero's arrest on charges that he embezzled $4 million in governmental funds (via dummy corporations) while his father was still in power.