After finalizing her term in 1990 Gutiérrez Castañeda was appointed Regional Director of the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF) in 1991.

Although her short presidency ended on July 20, 2000, she terminated the programs her predecessor was accused of, like foreign trips, gasoline allowances for the transportation of congress members, and the payroll discrepancies that so infuriated the public.

[1] In 2002 Gutiérrez Castañeda was re-elected representing the Colombia Always movement supporting once again Leonor Serrano who ran for a seat in the Senate.

On April 18, 2008, the Supreme Court of Colombia ordered a preliminary investigation against Senator Gutiérrez while she was President of Congress for her apparent relation to armed right rebel groups in the Colombian parapolitics scandal that shook the country, and led to the incarceration of various congressmen.

On 17 October 2011 the Office of the Inspector General of Colombia officially dropped the case against Congresswoman Gutiérrez.