Political Affiliation: Communist Youth; Secretary of the Local Committee of Tierra Amarilla; Member of the Regional Mining Cooperative Bateas Ltda. Date of Detention: April 10, 1975

REPRESSIVE SITUATION

On April 9, 1975, Aladín Esteban Rojas, a miner and communist militant, was detained in the plaza of Copiapó by officials of the Military Intelligence Service (S.I.M.) and taken to the local regiment. There, he was interrogated under torture regarding his political activities and released on April 10 at 11:00 a.m., with the obligation to return at 8:00 p.m. that same day.

When he returned home, Ulda Inés Leyton was able to observe that the victim had hematomas on his face and wounds all over his body, especially on his testicles and toes, caused by the application of electric current.

The following day, April 10, around 8:00 p.m., he went to the Motorized Infantry Regiment No. 23 in Copiapó, where he had been summoned, and from there he disappeared; his fate or whereabouts remain unknown to this day.

His wife, Ulda Inés Leyton, went to that military unit, where she was informed by the soldier on guard at the entrance that the victim had indeed entered the facility, but that he had not been seen leaving.

From that moment on, Aladín Esteban Rojas Ramírez disappeared. Nothing more would ever be heard of him. Furthermore, the motorcycle he used for transportation was never recovered, and its registration data were erased at the Municipality of Tierra Amarilla.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

On April 24, 1975, Dulcinea Ramírez Ramírez (the victim's mother) appeared at the Investigations Police Station in Copiapó and reported her son's disappearance. The following day, the records were transferred to the 1st Criminal Court of Copiapó, which accepted the report of alleged disappearance, filing it under No. 22.852.

During the short processing of this case—nearly four months—no significant efforts were made to determine the victim's whereabouts. Moreover, when an order to investigate was issued to the Investigations Police, the detectives in charge of carrying it out limited themselves to interviewing the complainant and "searching for him (Aladín Esteban Rojas) in different recreational venues and similar places in this city (Copiapó) without obtaining concrete information that would allow for the subsequent location of Rojas." On July 28, 1975, however, Aladín Esteban Rojas's presence at the Regiment was confirmed. In response to a court order from the Judge, Lieutenant Colonel Arturo Alvarez Sgolia, Commander of the military facility and Chief of the State of Emergency Zone for the Province of Atacama, replied that the victim had indeed been detained by personnel of "the unit under my command on April 9, 1975, for being President of the Communist Youth of the Tierra Amarilla commune and being suspected of holding clandestine meetings." According to the same Lieutenant Colonel, the victim was released "on April 12 of the current year due to a lack of evidence of guilt." The Public Jail and the Military Prosecutor's Office of Copiapó were also consulted, and they responded that there were no records of the victim. On August 6, the summary proceedings were closed, and the case was temporarily dismissed on the grounds that "the existence of the crime was not sufficiently proven." On September 2 of the same year, the Court of Appeals of La Serena confirmed the decision of the Copiapó Tribunal. Although there is no further information on this, it is known that in 1979, the victim's mother filed a criminal complaint for the crimes of kidnapping, unlawful coercion, serious injury, robbery, and possible qualified homicide committed against her son in the same 1st Criminal Court of Copiapó, naming Lieutenant Colonel Arturo Alvarez Sgolia as the person responsible. The case was filed under No. 26.015. The filing noted the contradiction between the information provided to the Court by the high-ranking Army officer in 1975 and the facts. It was made clear that Aladín Esteban Rojas Ramírez disappeared on April 10, 1975, around 8:00 p.m., after entering the Motorized Infantry Regiment No. 23 "Copiapó." On November 7, 1980, the priest Fernando Ariztía Ruiz, Bishop of Copiapó, requested that the Court of Appeals of that city appoint a Special Visiting Judge (Ministro en Visita) to take over the investigation and ruling of the criminal cases regarding the disappearances of Pedro Gabriel Acevedo Gallardo, Alfonso Lazo Rojas, and Aladín Esteban Rojas Ramírez. All of them disappeared in Copiapó in 1975. On December 26, 1980, the Court of Appeals, after requesting information on the status of the cases, rejected the request because "at this time, there is no apparent convenience in having a Minister of this Court take over the knowledge of those proceedings." Two years earlier, on November 14, 1978, the Episcopal Vicars of Santiago had submitted a similar request to the Supreme Court. Despite the various reports made to clarify the fate of Aladín Esteban Rojas after he entered the Regiment, as well as efforts at Carabineros police stations, the Public Jail, and local hospitals, he remains a forcibly disappeared person to this day.

Source: Vicariate of Solidarity

The work is dedicated to José Espejo, executed on March 19, 1976; Aladín Rojas Ramírez, forcibly disappeared on April 9, 1975; and Pedro Acevedo Gallardo, forcibly disappeared on April 28, 1975. "CONTEMPLATION OF MEMORY" was created by artist Marcela Romagnoli and portrays three individuals from Tierra Amarilla who were victims of the dictatorship.

These are three faces made in different materials: Carrara marble, granite, and basalt. This work is located at the Museum of Arts and Culture, which was completely restored and will be inaugurated on Saturday, June 29, with a memorial ceremony.

Source: eldinamo.cl 26/06/2019 Date: 06-26-2019

"Trees for Memory" initiative pays tribute to victims of the military dictatorship in Atacama

The activity, which is part of the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the civic-military coup, seeks to keep memory alive through the planting of trees in memorial spaces or sites where human rights were violated.

In Atacama, the milestone, coordinated by the Regional Ministerial Secretariat (SEREMI) of Cultures, Arts, and Heritage, took place at the House of Memory located in Copiapó. With the planting of 13 quebracho and caper shrubs at the House of Memory located in the commune of Copiapó, the "Trees for Memory" milestone was carried out.

This initiative is part of the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the civic-military coup and is organized by the Ministry of Cultures, Arts, and Heritage with the support of the Ministry of Agriculture.

The activity, which was attended by the highest regional authorities, led by Regional Presidential Delegate Cristhian Fuentes Varas, Regional Governor Miguel Vargas Correa, and the President of the Association of Relatives and Friends of Political Executions and Forcibly Disappeared Persons of Atacama, Mario Silva Álvarez, paid tribute to the 13 forcibly disappeared persons of Atacama and their families and friends, aiming to keep the memory of these individuals and their stories alive, as well as the events that occurred during the coup and the military dictatorship.

Maguindo Castillo Andrade, Benito Tapia Tapia, Ricardo García Posada, Pedro Acevedo Gallardo, Rafael Araya Villanueva, Yactong Juantock Guzmán, Aladin Rojas Ramírez, Guillermo Rojas Zamora, Alonso Lazo Rojas, José Guggiana Espoz, Lenin Díaz Silva, Leonardo Iribarren, and Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides are the 13 forcibly disappeared persons who now have a tree planted in the newly inaugurated Walk of Memory at the House of Memory in Copiapó. "Trees for Memory is an initiative that invites us to plant memory and harvest the future.

It is framed within the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the civic-military coup, giving us the opportunity to meet, dialogue, and reflect on the importance of democracy, while also paying tribute to the victims of the military dictatorship.

With this act of planting 13 trees, we remember and value the life stories of the 13 people who are still in the status of forcibly disappeared in the region," stated the Regional Ministerial Secretary of Cultures, Arts, and Heritage, Guillermo Rojas Iribarren.

TESTIMONIALS

During the memorial activity, testimonies were given by Rodolfo Villaroel, son of the miner Agustín Villaroel Carmona and spokesperson for the Association of Relatives and Friends of Political Executions and Forcibly Disappeared Persons of Atacama; Doris Acevedo, aunt of Pedro Acevedo Gallardo, a university student and forcibly disappeared person from Tierra Amarilla; and Katherine Rojas, daughter of Aladin Rojas Ramírez, a miner born in Tierra Amarilla and a forcibly disappeared person. "For me, this is a gigantic advance, an overwhelming step.

I have prayed so much and asked for someone to support us in the search for my father. Thanks to President Gabriel Boric, we have this opportunity to reunify Chile, and to forgive, we must be able to find our fathers, children, and relatives who are forcibly disappeared (...) nothing can repair the damage the dictatorship caused us, a core, transgenerational damage.

Commemorating is so painful, to be re-victimized and to live the eternal grief again. I don't know what it's like to live without grief, without feeling the pain of losing someone; it's a feeling of not being complete (...), my mom passed away in 2020 searching for her husband, my grandmother died waiting for her son, and there are still three siblings who continue searching for my father, so I have mixed feelings of pain and happiness for this commemorative act; it is something one never gets used to," mentioned Katherine Rojas Leyton.

The "Trees for Memory" initiative will be carried out until August 29 throughout the country, the day before the commemoration of the National and International Day of the Forcibly Disappeared (August 30), and will enable the planting of 2,085 trees to remember the victims of the military dictatorship. "This has been a very symbolic and significant ceremony, because these 13 fathers, brothers, and cousins, who are our family, are people who remain disappeared to this day (...) we never knew their fate, and since we do not know where their bodies are to perform the rituals that this entails—bringing them flowers, visiting them—we have symbolized them in these 13 trees that represent life, hope, and wisdom. This is a very relevant event for us (...) and this government is one of those that has been most concerned with human rights," noted Mario Silva Álvarez, president of the Association of Relatives and Friends of Political Executions and Forcibly Disappeared Persons of Atacama. Finally, the Regional Presidential Delegate, Cristhian Fuentes Varas, highlighted the importance of the milestone as a space for memory and reflection. "We are commemorating with the concept of living memory, and to value the legacy of the 13 forcibly disappeared persons we honor today, and those of us who accompany their families and friends. We plant these 13 trees to remember them, and also to remember the importance of democracy, in this activity that is framed within the commemoration of the 50 years since the coup d'état, and which our President Gabriel Boric promotes with all his imprint."

Source: cultura.gob.cl 08/02/2023

Supreme Court sentences former Army officer for the crime of a miner in Copiapó in 1975

The Supreme Court issued a sentence against former Army Brigadier Patricio Sergio Román Herrera, sentencing him to six years in prison for the qualified kidnapping of the miner Aladín Esteban Rojas Ramírez, who has been forcibly disappeared since April 10, 1975, in the city of Copiapó.

The miner and leader of the Communist Youth of Copiapó was detained by operational agents of the CIRE, which was led by the then-Army Captain Román Herrera. The CIRE operated from the Infantry Regiment No. 23 of Copiapó, under the orders of the late former General Ramsés Álvarez Scoglia.

The detainee was taken to the aforementioned military facility and subjected to brutal torture, according to the statements of various surviving witnesses and versions from those accused in the case. Patricio Sergio Román Herrera was sentenced to 6 years in prison for his responsibility in the crime of qualified kidnapping of the miner Aladín Esteban Rojas Ramírez.

The illicit act was perpetrated starting on April 10, 1975, in the city of Copiapó. In a unanimous ruling (case file 8.572-2019), the Second Chamber of the highest court—composed of ministers Manuel Antonio Valderrama, Leopoldo Llanos, María Teresa Letelier, Jorge Zepeda, and lawyer (i) Pía Tavolari—accepted the appeal for cassation on the merits presented by the plaintiff and, in a replacement sentence, confirmed the first-instance resolution in the part that sentenced the former Army officer.

The first-instance sentence had been issued by Minister Mario Carroza in October 2017, in which he sentenced Patricio Román Herrera as the perpetrator of the crime and acquitted three other defendants.

It should be noted that the convicted Patricio Román Herrera, at the time of Carroza's ruling, already had numerous proceedings against him for human rights violations during the dictatorship, for crimes committed both in Santiago and Copiapó, and had received sentences of 10 years for the crime of Germán Muñoz Flores and 8 years for the crime of Guillermo Sandoval Puga, both in the capital; in addition to another 5-year prison sentence for the qualified kidnapping of Pedro Acevedo Gallardo in Copiapó.

All these sentences were confirmed and executed. In January 2019, the Second Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals, presided over on that occasion by the execrable Juan Cristóbal Mera Muñoz, acquitted Román Herrera and ratified the acquittal of the remaining defendants; it found no one guilty and sentenced no one.

The highest court considered that the challenged sentence incurred an error of law by acquitting Román Herrera, reinstating the penalty imposed on him in the first instance. In this regard, the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court, among other grounds, states in its ruling: "That the Santiago Court of Appeals, analyzing the appeals filed against such resolution and having studied the evidence in the process, reached a conviction different from that which supported the first-instance decision, reviewing it to that effect, noting that, they prevent concluding that the accused Patricio Román Herrera had participation as a perpetrator in the investigated facts, without the evidence allowing for a variation of what was concluded for the reasons explained in considerations sixth through twelfth and which address his lack of connection to the point to be proven, that is, the participation of the accused." And it adds: "(...) in accordance with the facts recorded in the third consideration of the first-instance ruling and which are reproduced in this sentence, it is necessary to point out that the verdict under review did not analyze in detail the facts imputed to the accused Patricio Sergio Román Herrera, according to which it appears that the tasks he performed correspond to a set of acts that meant the deprivation of liberty under circumstances of mistreatment of the victim, which allows for the consideration that his responsibility as a perpetrator is established, since as operational chief of the CIRE, an organization that was responsible for the kidnapping of Mr. Aladín Rojas Ramírez, in his capacity as Captain, he issued orders, conducted interrogations, and determined the fate of the persons deprived of liberty, according to the documents outlined in the second motive of the first-instance sentence plus what was declared by Ramsés Álvarez, Commander of the Copiapó Regiment, Pedro Vivian Guaita, Hernán Portillo, Erasmo Vega, Felipe González, Manuel Retamal, Sergio Sánchez, Carlos González, Cristóbal Marihual, Abelardo Cabezas, so the appropriate categorization regarding the crime of kidnapping committed to the detriment of the victim is that provided for in Article 15 No. 2 of the Penal Code and the reproach for the proven illicit act must be adjusted to that quality."

Source: resumen.cl September 26, 2021