On October 4, 1973, six workers from the Hogar de Cristo prefabricated housing construction plant were arrested at their respective homes or workplaces:

José Salvador ACUÑA YAÑEZ, 29 years old, laborer, treasurer of the Factory Union.

Luis Alberto MUÑOZ VASQUEZ, 22 years old, laborer.

José Remigio PADILLA VILLOUTA, 23 years old, laborer.

Ernesto Raúl SALAZAR SALAZAR, 38 years old, laborer.

Luis Hernán SAN MARTIN CARES, 22 years old, laborer.

Ernesto René TORRES GUZMAN, 22 years old, laborer.

Their arrests were carried out by personnel from the carabineros unit of the Ñuble Highway Station and by military personnel. Eyewitnesses to the arrests state that the agents carried a list with the names of those to be detained.

Following the arrests, the presence of those affected was denied to their families at all detention centers in the Region. Despite this, some claim to have seen them at the aforementioned station. The various judicial investigations carried out yielded no positive results, as the authorities denied the fact of the arrests in response to every request for information.

The Commission reached the conviction that these six individuals were arrested and subsequently forcibly disappeared by State agents, which constitutes an act of grave violation of human rights. The number of those affected makes any other explanation for their disappearances completely implausible, as none of the families have had any news of them since that time.

The arrests and detentions are documented for each of them, and the corresponding agencies have indicated that none of them have registered any civil procedures mandatory for all Chilean citizens in the last seventeen years.

Ernesto Raúl Salazar, married, an employee at the "Hogar de Cristo" Prefabricated Housing Factory in Chillán and a union leader, was detained on October 4, 1973, at approximately 11:00 in the morning at his workplace under the following circumstances: A green Aro jeep arrived at the site carrying armed Carabineros and military personnel, who entered and asked for Ernesto Raúl Salazar, Luis Hernán San Martín Cares, and Luis Alberto Muñoz Vásquez.

Upon identifying them, they separated them and beat them severely; they then forced them to remove their work overalls and forcibly loaded them into a vehicle, where they were made to lie on the floor in the back. They immediately departed at high speed in an unknown direction.

The workers immediately notified his family members that he had been detained by uniformed personnel without a competent warrant. His wife made inquiries at the Public Jail, the Military Prosecutor's Office, and the 2a. Comisaría of Chillán without obtaining any information regarding the victim.

That same night, October 4, three other workers from the factory were detained: José Acuña Yáñez, José Padilla Villouta, and Ernesto Torres Guzmán. Currently, all 6 remain forcibly disappeared.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

His wife, Victoriana Palma Paredes, filed an amparo (habeas corpus) petition before the Chillán Court of Appeals on March 10, 1975, under case file No. 94.698.

The Court issued an official request to the Ñuble Carabineros Prefecture. On March 12, 1975, the 2nd Prefect and Chief, Lt. Colonel Leonidas Venegas Guzmán, responded, stating that the detention of the victim was not recorded in the logbooks of the 2a. Comisaría of Chillán.

Based on this single investigative step, the Court rejected the amparo petition the following day, March 13, and referred the case to the Criminal Court on duty to open an investigation into the alleged disappearance of the victim.

On March 10, 1975, the 1st Criminal Court of Chillán opened the case for Alleged Disappearance, file No. 41.580.

The judge issued official requests to various administrative, police, and military authorities, who responded that they had no information regarding the victim. These records formed the basis for the resolution of May 30, 1975, issued by the judge to close the summary proceedings and temporarily dismiss the case on the grounds that the existence of a crime had not been proven.

On June 26, 1975, the Chillán Court of Appeals confirmed the ruling of the 1st Criminal Court of Chillán.

On March 29, 1979, the Chillán Court of Appeals, meeting in an extraordinary plenary session, agreed to appoint magistrate Boris Acharán Bau as a Visiting Judge to oversee cases of the forcibly disappeared; this case was closed and dismissed in June 1979.

On June 5, 1979, the reopening of the summary proceedings was decreed at the request of the plaintiff.

On September 13, 1979, Victoriana Palma Paredes filed a criminal complaint before the 1st Criminal Court of Chillán for the crimes of kidnapping and possible aggravated homicide of her husband, Ernesto Salazar, against Carabineros Corporal Osvaldo Ruiz Osorio and any others who may be accomplices, perpetrators, or accessories, consolidating the complaint with case No. 41.580 regarding the victim's alleged disappearance.

The judge proceeded to issue official requests to various agencies and authorities, receiving the same response that no information existed regarding the victim. The Prefect of Ñuble responded on September 26, 1979. The Commander of the No. 9 "Chillán" Regiment did so on September 28, 1979. Minister of the Interior Sergio Fernández F. responded on September 27, 1979.

On October 1, 1979, the Chief of the Central Identification Office informed the judge that there was no record or identification file for the victim in that office.

On October 10, 1979, the judge of the 1st Criminal Court consolidated case file No. 41.580 regarding the alleged disappearance of Ernesto Raúl Salazar with case file No. 40531 regarding the alleged disappearance of Ernesto René Torres Guzmán; the reason for the resolution was that former Carabineros Corporal Osvaldo Ruiz Osorio was named as a suspect in both cases.

In this case, the then-Minister of the Interior, Sergio Fernández Fernández, also responded to an official request, stating that the National Intelligence Center (CNI) had no record of the detention of either person.

Carabineros Corporal Osvaldo Ruiz Osorio testified, denying the detention and further claiming that there were never any detainees at the Highway Station (Tenencia Carreteras). He was not confronted with the spouse of the detainee José Acuña, who had seen Torres and others of the forcibly disappeared workers from the "Hogar de Cristo" at the aforementioned station.

On May 12, 1980, the case was temporarily dismissed because the perpetration of the crime had not been justified. The Court of Appeals approved the resolution on the 28th of the same month.

Source: Corporación Report