In Santiago, on March 22, 1978, appeared Mr. ARMANDO FERNANDEZ LARIOS, Chilean, Army Captain, single, identity card 5861970 from Santiago, with address for these purposes at the Army Instruction Directorate of this city, never detained, who, interrogated under promise to tell the truth, states: In the year 1976 and while fulfilling an "extrainstitutional mission" in the DINA, I was responsible for the fulfillment of a mission to Paraguay and another to the U.S. in that sequence.

In said Hotel, we registered with the names we carried in our passports, that is, Alejandro Faundez Lyon.

Source: Judiciary, April 12, 1978

Argentina requests extradition of former Chilean agent from the US

The Argentine justice system requested the preventive arrest of former National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) agent Armando Fernández Larios from the US for extradition purposes, as he is charged with the assassination of General Carlos Prats and his wife, which occurred in Buenos Aires in 1974.

Judicial sources reported today that a year ago, the prosecutor of the case, Jorge Alvarez Berlanda, had made this request, but Judge María Servini de Cubría granted the measure in recent days, and the procedures have already been initiated through the Argentine Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Protection agreement The sources indicated that, apparently, Larios, who currently resides in the city of Miami, has some type of protection agreement with the United States. "That is why the extradition was requested, so that they can clarify what the situation is," asserted sources from Servini de Cubría's court, who did not rule out that Larios might eventually be interrogated in the United States, just as former agent Michael Townley, the confessed material author of the double crime, was.

Apparently, the extrajudicial agreement would keep the former agent of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) safe from the claims of the national justice system, which has already requested his extradition for the so-called "Caravan of Death." Before requesting the extradition, Servini de Cubría sent a letter rogatory to the US justice system to take an investigative statement from Fernández Larios, but the request did not receive a response.

Source: La Tercera, May 24, 2002

The only punishment for Armando Fernández Larios

Claiming he wanted to "clear his name," in January 1987, Army Major and DINA agent Armando Fernández Larios negotiated his surrender to the United States government to avoid both Chilean courts and potential retaliation from his comrades.

However, in his own refuge and despite the protection of the US government, he is close to receiving what will likely be his only punishment, at the hands of a court in Miami. On May 26, Judge Joan Lenard of the Federal District Court of Miami, Florida, will begin hearing witnesses from both sides to resolve a lawsuit filed in February 1999 by the family of Winston Cabello Bravo, who was murdered in Copiapó on October 17, 1973, by then-Lieutenant Fernández Larios, a member of the Caravan of Death commanded by General Sergio Arellano Stark.

The civil lawsuit accuses him of crimes against humanity, extrajudicial execution, and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, and is based on two legal bodies that, over the last two decades, have allowed victims of repression from Bosnia to Central America to prosecute their executioners in US courts.

Winston's sister, Zita Cabello, an economist and professor of Latin American Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, had spent months investigating Armando Fernández Larios, hiring a private detective to track him down.

In late 1998, Zita delivered a 15-page document containing background information on Fernández Larios to the Center for Justice & Accountability (CJA) in San Francisco, California, which, among other things, sponsors civil lawsuits against human rights violators residing, passing through, or holding assets in the United States.

Later, she went to the largest law firm in California and convinced them to take the case pro bono. "These cases send a warning to human rights violators that they cannot reside or even visit the United States without fear of being discovered and sued by their victims.

These trials are a type of punishment. There is no doubt that it alters the lives of these perpetrators," notes Sandra Coliver, Executive Director of the CJA. Cabello, a 28-year-old commercial engineer, had been the Regional Director of Planning in Copiapó during the government of the Unidad Popular.

The day after the military coup, he was summoned along with other heads of public services dependent on Salvador Allende's government to the office of Commander Oscar Haag, head of the State of Siege zone.

That day he was detained in the local jail because, supposedly, his vehicle had been used for "suspicious purposes." Two weeks later, Zita's husband, Patricio Barrueto, who worked with Cabello, was detained.

He was never charged, nor was he subjected to a War Council. A week before his death, military prosecutor Carlos Brito assured him that he would be released. On October 16, 1973, General Arellano's Caravan arrived in Copiapó.

He selected 16 prisoners for execution. Thirteen of them, including Cabello, were taken from the jail that night and massacred by members of the entourage and some officers of the regiment. The other three were murdered the following day.

The official version was that they had died in an escape attempt. The 13 were buried in an unmarked grave in the Copiapó cemetery and were not discovered until 1990. Zita and her husband, once released, fled the country with their young son on December 12, 1974, obtaining special visas from the United States Embassy. "Before we left, a friend who worked at ECLAC invited me to dinner at her house.

At a moment when we were alone, she asked me, 'Do you know how your brother died? Armando Fernández Larios killed him with a corvo (knife).' She described the way my brother had died. I didn't want to know; it was too terrible.

I didn't tell anyone; there was no point in increasing the pain. But I never forgot the name of Armando Fernández Larios," recounted Zita Cabello, who was in Chile in August. However, it was not until 1995 that Zita Cabello learned that her brother's killer was living in the United States.

That year she was preparing a documentary on the Caravan of Death ("Nunca Más, Para Que Nunca Más," 1997), and on a trip to Chile, a friend mentioned it to her. "My hair stood on end. It was so horrible, and at the same time ironic, that the material executioner of my brother's death was living in the United States, and furthermore protected by the US government.

It is an unreal situation," comments Zita. In May 1999, advised by his lawyer Steven Davis, Fernández Larios delivered his first statement to Judge Lenard: "In January 1987, I resigned from the Chilean Army and left Chile to come to the United States and face the criminal charges against me.

The United States government did not charge me with torture or murder (and I have never committed acts of torture or murder...)." On the 24th of that month, he requested that the court dismiss the case, alleging lack of jurisdiction.

In August 2001, Judge Joan Lenard denied the request. In November 2001, Fernández Larios once again appealed the charges, a request denied by Judge Lenard in June of this year. A year ago, he was interrogated for the first time.

During the three days the interrogation lasted, he denied having known Winston Cabello, having tortured and murdered, or having witnessed or known about the crimes committed by the caravan. He only limited himself to acknowledging his participation in General Arellano Stark's entourage as his bodyguard.

Fernández Larios was born in Washington, DC, the son of an army officer commissioned in that city at the time. In 1970, at age 20 and already a sub-lieutenant in the Chilean Army, he participated in the Combat Arms Orientation course at Fort Gullick, School of the Americas, in Panama, between January 12 and February 13, 1970.

He would meet some of his course mates again four years later, all of them now DINA agents: Rolando Mosqueira Jarpa, Hugo Acevedo Godoy, and José Zara Holger. After his participation in the assault on La Moneda Palace on September 11, 1973, the young lieutenant was commissioned to join Arellano Stark's entourage, contributing to the sequence of deaths and disappearances during the caravan through the south and north of the country.

In 1974, he participated in the torture, death, and disappearance of Manuel Sanhueza Mellado, 30, a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Youth (JJ.CC.), detained on July 10, 1974, in Arica.

His remains were found in a mass grave in Pisagua in June 1990. In September 1974, he participated in the disappearance of David Silberman, a case for which he has been prosecuted by Judge Juan Guzmán.

At the beginning of 1975, apparently already as a member of the DINA's Foreign Department, Fernández was sent to Lima, Peru, on an undercover operation to establish contact with the liaison of the Socialist Party Directorate in that country, with the goal of reaching the party's leadership.

His exquisite tastes gave him away. The liaison did not trust this strange "comrade," who summoned him to a meeting at a luxury hotel and ordered whiskey. The operation was aborted. The following year, in August 1976, Fernández Larios returned to his birthplace with a fake passport with the mission of preparing the ground for the assassination of Orlando Letelier and Ronni Moffitt, which occurred a month later.

Prosecuted by a federal court in Washington in 1978 for his participation in the crime, the Chilean regime denied the request for the extradition of Fernández Larios to the United States. However, almost a decade later, the DINA agent negotiated his surrender to the United States through his mediator, Federico Willoughby, and in January 1987, he was picked up in Brazil by FBI special agent Carter Cornick, who had investigated the Letelier case, and taken back to the US capital.

Detained in Washington, Fernández Larios provided the US justice system with evidence that the homicide had been planned and directed by the DINA Directorate; that evidence has never been made public. Later, he negotiated a plea deal with the Department of Justice to plead guilty as an accessory to the crime, in exchange for being able to live and work in the US after serving his sentence, and having the assurance that he would not be extradited to Chile under any circumstances.

Judge Barrington Parker sentenced him to seven years in prison. However, the magistrate considered him such an exemplary collaborator that, after serving only five months in a federal prison, he granted a request from his lawyers and set him free.

The former DINA agent moved to Miami. According to his own statements, he never accepted entering the witness protection program and continued living under his real name. It is still unclear if he holds resident status or if he enjoys its benefits de facto.

He has not renewed his Chilean passport, and he is not registered at the Chilean Embassy. It is possible that he formalized his US citizenship due to the fact that he was born in that country. In late 1988, Fernández Larios bought a condominium in the Kendall neighborhood, with a pool and tennis courts included.

He also set up an import-export business called Fervic Corp., which was short-lived and whose operations no one could verify. It was in that condominium where, one dawn in March 1999, a judicial emissary notified him of the lawsuit against him.

Shortly after, he abandoned his condominium and today lives with his girlfriend. He is currently the assistant manager of the Auto Sport International mechanical workshop in Miami-Dade County. When he was notified of the lawsuit, Fernández Larios had just returned from a trip to Chile, where witnesses saw him and spoke with him.

His activities included meetings with former comrades-in-arms. Ironically, only five months after returning to Miami, Judge Guzmán prosecuted him for the aggravated kidnapping of 19 victims of the Caravan who remain disappeared.

In October of that year, the Supreme Court authorized the magistrate's request to extradite Fernández Larios. It is very unlikely that the US government will agree to his extradition if it wants to keep its word.

The agreement signed with Fernández on January 29, 1987, in point 5, letter g), states: "The government agrees that it will not attempt to deport Mr. Fernández from the United States to Chile, nor will it cooperate in his extradition to Chile." Judge Guzmán's extradition request has been "under review" at the Department of Justice since June 2000.

However, the same paragraph of the agreement leaves him unprotected regarding extradition requests from other countries: "This does not prevent his extradition from the United States to any other country other than Chile in relation to crimes not covered by this agreement," the agreement says.

On May 23, Argentine judge María Servini de Cubría, who is investigating the assassination of the former commander-in-chief of the Chilean army Carlos Prats and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, in Buenos Aires on September 30, 1974, requested the extradition of Fernández, who is prosecuted in that country for the double crime.

But for Zita Cabello, the most likely scenario is that Fernández Larios will continue in the United States, although paying, literally, for life for his crimes. "The money doesn't make sense to us, but it is the only legal possibility that the US gives us to seek justice.

This is a moral and political trial. Before, Fernández Larios lived quietly. Now he will have the punishment of worrying his whole life about not having money, because they are going to take it from him. It is important to set this precedent, so that future generations know that crimes will not go unpunished," she points out.

Source: Piensachile.com, September 26, 2002

Fernández Larios denies participation in '73 assassination

For almost two hours yesterday, former Army Major Armando Fernández Larios was interrogated in the Southern District Court of Miami in the civil trial being held against him for the assassination of Winston Cabello on October 17, 1973, in Copiapó.

The former member of the Caravan of Death said he did not remember what happened that night—in which 13 political prisoners were murdered—although he did admit that the Puma helicopter in which they were traveling was in Copiapó, which had been denied by other members of the group. "He was laughing, he was ironic and aggressive," Aldo Cabello, brother of the executed man, told La Tercera regarding Fernández during the interrogation.

Furthermore, he relates, "he asked the translator how to say 'firing squad' and 'execution' in English, since they were words he had never used... he didn't know how to say them." Time ran out yesterday for the plaintiff's lawyer to finish his questions.

Therefore, on Tuesday, Fernández Larios will return to the stand. With that, the round of witnesses will close, so that between the end of next week and the beginning of the following, the jury will deliberate.

Source: La Tercera, October 4, 2003

Jury brings 4 charges against Fernández Larios

In silence and motionless, former Chilean military officer Armando Fernández Larios heard the sentence of the jury that ordered him to pay four million dollars to the family of engineer Winston Cabello, a victim of the events of September 1973 in the city of Copiapó.

Fernández Larios and his lawyer, Steven Davis, did not move from the room and, without looking to the sides, both waited for it to be completely empty. The lawyer for the retired army officer left through the main door, but alone, because the former uniformed officer avoided the press.

Steven Davis appeared surprised and dissatisfied with the ruling and stressed that he will appeal the verdict. Regarding the large sum of money that Fernández Larios must pay to the Cabello Bravo family, Davis stressed: "He doesn't have a single peso; he is an ordinary citizen, a worker; he cannot pay that sum." Meanwhile, after the magistrate left the room, the Cabello Bravo family, with eyes full of tears, began to celebrate what for them, they said, constitutes a true triumph against all those responsible for the crimes committed by the so-called "Caravan of Death." Once outside the federal building, the congratulations from friends and acquaintances were immediate. Aldo Cabello said he was happy about what happened and pointed out that "this is not only for my brother, but for all those who died unjustly during the dictatorship." The same was said by the daughters of the deceased economist. "We are not looking for money" Four million dollars is the sum that Fernández Larios must pay. In this regard, Zita Cabello emphasized that they were not looking for money but justice, and added: "I know he doesn't have a peso and that doesn't matter. And if he happens to pay something, although I don't think it will happen, but if he does, we are going to donate everything to the CJA," the organization that helped, guided, and advised them to carry out the lawsuit. The Cabello Bravo family will return to California to remember the next anniversary of her brother's death. Armando Fernández Larios has 30 days to file his appeal which, if accepted, would leave the final decision in the hands of judges and not a jury.

Source: El Mercurio, October 16, 2003

Fernández Larios faces trial in the US for Caravan of Death

Former DINA agent Armando Fernández Larios is facing a new civil trial in the United States for a case involving a victim of the Caravan of Death. According to La Segunda, the trial is taking place in the Miami-Dade District Court, and the family of economist Winston Cabello Bravo is acting as the plaintiff.

The defense for the former agent, led by jurist Steven Davis, denied the accusations of torture and murder brought against him by Cabello's family. It is expected that the case will be ruled upon within three weeks, which, if adverse to Fernández Larios, would include the payment of compensation.

Aldo Cabello Bravo, the victim's brother, noted that "this trial has a moral and symbolic purpose so that human rights violators can never again come to the United States and hide behind their crimes." Fernández Larios is subject to the witness protection system in the US after he surrendered to that country's justice system and was sentenced to three years in prison as an accessory to the assassination of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier.

Source: La Nacion, May 22, 2003

Trial against Fernández Larios revives the 'Caravan of Death'

The civil trial against Armando Fernández Larios, a former member of the dissolved National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), has revived in Miami the crimes committed by the so-called "Caravan of Death." In the opening statements of the prosecution and defense lawyers, the strategies that both attorneys will follow were shown today.

Leo Cunningham, the lawyer for the family of one of Fernández Larios's alleged victims, stated that he will demonstrate that the former Army major is "legally responsible" for the "murders, torture, and crimes against humanity" he committed. "We will convincingly demonstrate that the accused was part of the nefarious Caravan of Death, that he knew its objective, and that he conspired to select those he would execute," said the lawyer for the Cabello family, who filed the lawsuit against Fernández Larios for the murder of Winston Dwight Cabello Bravo on October 17, 1973.

The "Caravan of Death," planned by the DINA, operated in various cities during the months following the 1973 coup d'état and is attributed with the deaths of some 75 officials and supporters of Salvador Allende's government.

Defense: "He did not kill or torture" For his part, Steven Davis, Fernández Larios's defense attorney, denied the accusations and asserted that his client "did not kill, did not select, did not torture, and had nothing to do with the death of Winston Cabello." He added that the prosecution does not have a witness who can affirm that they saw Fernández Larios kill Cabello.

At the same time, he asserted that he will present the testimony of the material author of the execution, Captain Patricio Díaz, a member at the time of the military garrison in the northern Chilean city of Copiapó, where Cabello was murdered.

Davis added that in his testimony, Díaz would clarify that he received the execution order from "his direct boss, Colonel Haag, who received these instructions from General Sergio Arellano Stark, head of the Caravan of Death." According to legal experts, such testimony would exonerate Fernández Larios as a "material author" in a criminal trial, but perhaps not in a civil trial, in which it is not necessary to prove authorship "beyond a reasonable doubt" to be declared responsible.

The strategy designed by the defense seems to point to that objective, as attorney Cunningham stressed that there were three ways to obtain a verdict of responsibility in a civil trial: direct authorship, assistance, and conspiracy, and that he "will emphasize these last two paths." In addition to the opening arguments, the eight-person jury (five women and three men, among whom four are Hispanic, two Black, and two Anglo) heard the testimonies of Patricio Barrueto, Winston's brother-in-law, and various video testimonies sent from Chile.

Fernández Larios, 53, almost bald, a little overweight, and dressed in a gray double-breasted suit, remained impassive during the session and refused to speak to journalists. The same attitude of seriousness and silence prevailed among Winston Cabello's three siblings, Zita, Kira, and Aldo, and among the more than ten relatives of the murdered man present in the court, who ostensibly avoided making eye contact with the accused.

The civil trial against Fernández Larios was invoked based on two 19th-century laws used to prevent piracy crimes: the Alien Tort Claims Act and the Torture Victim Protection Act. In 2002, both laws were used in a trial in Miami against two Salvadoran generals accused of torture and ordered to pay 54.6 million dollars in compensation, although both declared themselves "paupers." However, for the Cabello family, most of whom have resided in California (USA) since 1974, the process against Fernández Larios does not pursue monetary ends.

Fernández Larios has lived in the US since 1987 under an alleged "protection agreement" that he obtained after pleading guilty to complicity in the assassination of former Chilean Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier, which occurred in Washington in 1976.

For their part, Argentine judges have requested his extradition to be interrogated for the 1974 assassination in Buenos Aires of Chilean General Carlos Prats, former Minister of Defense and Interior under Allende. Both crimes are attributed to the DINA, Pinochet's secret police.

Source: El Mostrador, September 24, 2003

Conviction of Fernández Larios confirmed

The federal Court of Appeals in Atlanta confirmed yesterday the sentence handed down by a lower civil court against former DINA agent Armando Fernández Larios, accused of the murder of economist Winston Cabello, which occurred in October 1973.

With the decision, adopted by a panel of three judges, the claim presented by the former agent, in which he denied his participation in Cabello's murder and argued that the lawsuit was filed out of time in 1999, was rejected.

In this way, the conviction handed down in 2004 was confirmed, which ordered Fernández Larios to pay four million dollars to Cabello's relatives, as well as the results of the investigation that were presented in a Miami court in the first civil conviction in the US for crimes against humanity.

The legal action was filed by the family of Cabello, who was one of 13 political prisoners executed on October 17, 1973, in Copiapó by the so-called "Caravan of Death." Fernández Larios has lived in the United States since 1987, when he cooperated with the justice system in the case of the assassination of Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier and his assistant, the American Ronni Moffitt, which occurred in Washington in 1976.

On that occasion, the agent pleaded guilty to concealing the facts in exchange for the promise that he would not be extradited to Chile. After five months in a US prison, he settled in Miami, where he was found by Cabello's relatives, who filed the lawsuit for damages received abroad.

Human rights organizations, such as Human Rights Watch, have demanded the extradition of Fernández Larios to Chile and Argentina. In Santiago, the former DINA agent is prosecuted in the Caravan of Death case by Minister Juan Guzmán for his responsibility in the crimes of the entourage led by General (Ret.) Sergio Arellano Stark.

In Argentina, meanwhile, he is wanted for his alleged participation in the assassination of the former commander-in-chief of the Army, General Carlos Prats, and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, in Buenos Aires in 1974.

Source: La Nacion, March 16, 2005

US court ruling forces Fernández Larios to pay four million dollars

A US federal appeals court ratified today a 4-million-dollar ruling that retired Army Lieutenant Armando Fernández Larios must pay to the family of an economist, after having been found guilty of the murder of a political prisoner during the bloody 1973 coup in that country.

In October 2003, a jury ruled in favor of the family of economist Winston Cabello, who sued Fernández in 1999, and today a panel of three judges from an Atlanta Appeals Circuit ratified the ruling. As in the previous ruling, it was established that the former uniformed officer was responsible for the crimes of extrajudicial killing, cruelty, torture, and crimes against humanity for his role in the massacre of political prisoners by the Caravan of Death.

In Chile, Fernández is prosecuted in the Caravan of Death case by Minister Juan Guzmán for his responsibility in the crimes committed during the entourage's passage through the north and south of the country, which was led by General (Ret.) Sergio Arellano Stark.

Cabello's relatives filed the lawsuit in accordance with a 1989 law on reparations for damages received abroad, after learning that Fernández was living and working in Miami. The law has allowed for the filing of lawsuits against Salvadoran generals, Serbian leaders, large companies, and officials of the former Philippine ruler Ferdinand Marcos.

Although some of the plaintiffs have received compensation for several million dollars, those figures are usually symbolic because the accused generally do not have enough money to pay them. On October 17, 1973, Winston Cabello Barrueto, a well-known regional planning official during the government of President Salvador Allende, was murdered by the Caravan of Death in the city of Copiapó.

Source: La Nacion, March 15, 2005

The magistrate sentenced Manuel Contreras and Marcelo Moren Brito to seven years in prison as authors of the kidnapping and disappearance of civil engineer and Communist militant David Silberman. Former agent Armando Fernández Larios, who has lived in the United States since 1987, was the one who removed Silberman from the Penitenciaría using a false identity.

Minister Jorge Zepeda requested that the Supreme Court proceed with the extradition request from the United States for former DINA agent Major (Ret.) Armando Fernández Larios, on the charge of having been the Army officer who, using a false identity and aided by a well-orchestrated operation, kidnapped the civil engineer and former general manager of Cobrechuqui, PC militant David Silberman Gurovich, from the Santiago Penitenciaría on October 4, 1974.

The judge formulated the request in the first-instance sentence for the kidnapping and disappearance of the engineer. In his ruling, Zepeda sentenced the former head of the DINA, General (Ret.) Manuel Contreras, and the former head of the Villa Grimaldi clandestine center, Colonel (Ret.) Marcelo Moren Brito, to seven years in prison as authors.

However, Zepeda acquitted former agents Carlos Labarca Sanhueza and Marcos Derpich Miranda, who were also prosecuted and accused due to their involvement in the operation.

The magistrate did not grant Contreras and Moren any benefits, meaning they must serve the sentence after completing their current sentences of twelve and ten years, respectively, for the kidnapping and disappearance of MIR member Miguel Ángel Sandoval. Additionally, the minister ordered the State to pay 1.04 billion pesos to Silberman’s widow, children, and siblings.

Silberman had been sentenced by a questioned war council in Calama to 13 years in prison under the laws of Internal State Security and arms control, despite having voluntarily turned himself in to military justice on September 15, 1973. For this reason, he was transferred to the Santiago Penitenciaría to serve his sentence.

On the afternoon of October 4, 1974, the then-lieutenant and DINA agent Armando Fernández Larios appeared at that prison in uniform, carrying identification card 245-03 under the name Alejandro Quintero Romero.

Fernández ordered the warden, Jorge Ortiz Aedo, to hand over the prisoner, showing him an order from a Colonel Marcelo Rodríguez, “military advisor to the war councils in the military courts.”

He also told him that he could verify the order by calling 51-64-03, asking for a certain “military auditor Leyton” or Colonel Rodríguez himself. The warden complied and handed over Silberman.

A white Ika-Renault jeep was waiting for Fernández. Naturally, everything was false, and none of the officers named by Fernández Larios existed.

Previously, agent Derpich, appointed within the DINA as being in charge of “confidential special tasks” at the Compañía de Teléfonos de Chile, had supervised the wiretapping of the required telephone lines.

According to a judicial statement from April 2, 1998, by the Bishop of Copiapó, Fernando Ariztía, when he interviewed Pinochet shortly after the kidnapping along with Rabbi Angel Kreiman, the military chief replied: “Silberman was kidnapped by a MIR commando disguised as soldiers.” Manuel Contreras maintained the same to the courts at that time.

But to make the story more credible, he added that the ID card 245-03 in the name of Quintero “was found during a raid on the house of MIR member Alejandro de la Barra in December 1974.”

The thesis was not random, as the dictatorship was already planning the setup of Operation Colombo, which would begin with Silberman. According to a statement by former agent Enrique Arancibia Clavel in the Buenos Aires trial for the double homicide of General Carlos Prats and his wife, at the beginning of 1975, “General Raúl Iturriaga Neumann (head of the DINA foreign apparatus) arrived in Argentina and informed me that his mission consisted of making a Chilean subversive with the last name Simelman or something similar, who had died in Chile, appear in Argentina, with that operation having been baptized as Operation Colombo.”

Indeed, in April 1975, the semi-destroyed body of a person appeared in a basement in Buenos Aires who—it was said—was David Silberman, which was denied by his family, who traveled to identify him. Next to the body, a sign was found reading “executed by the MIR.” Precisely, Colombo consisted of making it believed that 119 Chileans were never detained and that they had fled to Argentina, where they died in political vendettas of the left or perished in clashes with the Argentine Armed Forces.

Source: La Nacion, September 28, 2005

Extradition of Fernández Larios Accepted

The Second Chamber of the Supreme Court authorized the extradition of the former agent of the dissolved National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), Major (Ret.) Armando Fernández Larios, so that he may provide testimony in the case being investigated regarding the kidnapping and disappearance of the general manager of Cobrechuqui, David Silberman Gurovich, which occurred in October 1974.

The Criminal Chamber of the highest court thus accepted the request made on September 27, 2005, by investigating judge Jorge Zepeda, within the framework of the sentences handed down against the top leadership of the military regime’s repressive organization.

The retired Army major resides in the United States under the witness protection program after collaborating in the clarification of the homicide of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier del Solar, perpetrated in September 1976 in the city of Washington.

He is also mentioned in other cases involving human rights violations, including the Caravan of Death, Operation Condor, and the double homicide of General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert.

Case Background

Minister Zepeda sentenced former heads of the dissolved National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), General (Ret.) Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda and Brigadier (Ret.) Marcelo Moren Brito, to seven years in prison as authors of the kidnapping of the disappeared manager of Cobrechuqui, civil engineer David Silberman Gurovich.

In his resolution, the magistrate acquitted Carlos Labarca Sanhueza and Marcos Derpich Miranda of criminal responsibility, as they were preliminarily investigated in this case under the classification of accomplices.

According to the case records, on October 4, 1974, members of the defunct DINA removed Silberman from the former Penitenciaría where he remained imprisoned after being subjected to a War Council in Calama, Second Region.

According to witness accounts included in the file, the supervisor of the current Codelco was seen in barracks of the repressive organization such as José Domingo Cañas and Cuatro Alamos.

The judge also requested that the Supreme Court proceed with the extradition of Army Captain (Ret.) Armando Fernández Larios, who resides in the United States under the witness protection program after collaborating in the clarification of the homicide of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier del Solar, perpetrated in September 1976 in the city of Washington.

Zepeda also ordered the State to pay 1.04 billion pesos to Silberman’s widow, children, and siblings for moral damages.

David Silberman Gurovich was the general manager of Cobre Chuqui as of September 11, 1973. A Communist Party militant, he voluntarily presented himself on the fourth day after the coup d'état to the military commander of Calama, Major Fernando Reveco Valenzuela, remaining detained and subjected to proceedings by a wartime military tribunal.

On September 28 of that year, the War Council handed down a sentence condemning him to ten years in prison for crimes contemplated in the State Security Law and three years for the Arms Control Law, having to serve his sentence in Santiago, as he had been requested from there by decree. Around October 2, he was imprisoned in the Penitenciaría of this city.

On October 4 of the same year, he was removed from the former Penitenciaría and taken to the Air Force War Academy to testify in case file 1-73 of the Aviation Prosecutor's Office, remaining in that facility until October 20, the day he was returned to the Santiago Penitenciaría.

In the interval, in the Calama jail, where several people were serving sentences from the same War Council—executives of CobreChuqui and militants of the Socialist and Communist parties—around 25 prisoners were removed on October 19, 1973, who were executed by firing squad and their bodies hidden from their families.

Among the victims were Haroldo Cabrera, manager of the same company, who was next in hierarchy to Silberman; Carlos Berger, head of communications for the company; and David Miranda, also an executive of the copper firm.

According to records, Silberman remained in Santiago until October 4, 1973.

On that date, he was removed from the prison facility by DINA agents who forged Army documents in order to deceive the Gendarmerie and secure the delivery of the detainee.

Once outside the facility, he was taken to the house that the security agency maintained at José Domingo Cañas. From there, on October 5, he was taken to 4 Alamos, to then be taken again on October 6 or 7 to José Domingo Cañas, in whose facilities he remained until the middle of the same month, when he was transferred to 4 Alamos, from where he disappeared in the first days of November.

Contreras and Morén Brito are serving prison sentences at the Cordillera Prison for the kidnapping of MIR member Miguel Angel Sandoval Rodríguez.

Source: TVN, January 5, 2006

Judicial Defeat for a Killer: Fernández Larios Exposed

The day Armando Fernández Larios refused to change his identity after agreeing to the protection of the United States Department of Justice, he did not imagine that his decision was starting a countdown—not for the explosion of a bomb, like the one that killed former Chilean Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier and his secretary, Ronnie Moffitt, in Washington—but for a sentence for “crimes against humanity” that would surprise him 16 years later in a Miami civil court.

These were times when the former soldier and DINA agent felt safe in the United States after confessing his participation in the assassination of Letelier and collaborating in its clarification. In fact, he lived quietly in Miami during all these years, without suspecting that the sister of one of his victims had decided to obtain justice.

Zita Cabello, sister of economist Winston Cabello Bravo, one of the 74 opponents of the Pinochet regime murdered by the so-called Caravan of Death, was following his steps closely.

This doctor of economics dedicated almost five years to investigating her brother's death. She traveled to Chile ten times from the United States—the country where she resides—to seek evidence that allowed for the reconstruction of the story, “not only of Winston’s death in Copiapó, but of all the crimes of the Caravan of Death.” She acknowledges that it was a meticulous task, because the evidence and witnesses she obtained in Chile allowed her to demonstrate in the Miami court that her brother’s assassination constituted a crime against humanity.

Finally, since United States civil courts cannot apply penal or criminal sanctions, Armando Fernández Larios was ordered to pay four million dollars in compensation. It was ruled that he is “legally responsible” for an extrajudicial killing, torture, physical and mental cruelty, and crimes against humanity. “This trial has shown Chilean society and the international community what is possible to do in terms of justice.

Now we must ask ourselves how much more is possible to do. It is our challenge,” Zita Cabello pointed out to Punto Final.

Debt of Justice

You dedicated several years to seeking evidence to prosecute Armando Fernández Larios for the assassination of your brother. Why did you decide to undertake that task 26 years after the crime?

“Winston’s death marked my life forever. Since October 17, 1973, everything I have done is linked to the deep pain of losing my brother. That same pain—which even prevented me for years from pronouncing his name—led me to ask myself what meaning I could give to that loss.

I concluded that it was to fight against impunity so that crimes like those committed by the dictatorship would never happen again. When 26 years had passed since his death, I saw the possibility of obtaining justice and did not hesitate for an instant. I hope this struggle contributes to preventing barbarism and creating a more humane, solidary, and dignified world.”

What did this experience mean for your life?

“Those years were among the most difficult of my life, but at the same time enriching. I opened many doors that I thought would remain closed forever. I spoke with people I had always seen as enemies. I learned of human generosity and also its cruelty.

I traveled a long, difficult, and sometimes very lonely path, looking for evidence and witnesses to prosecute Fernández Larios. If it were necessary, I would travel it again.”

What were the emotional costs of investigating a painful past?

“There were many. In 1974, I learned very precise details of how Winston’s last moments of life were. He had a painful death at the hands of Fernández Larios, who killed him with a corvo (knife). I did not share this information with anyone.

Only in the trial did I verbalize that truth and share the secret kept for years with my siblings. It was very intense, because the evidence presented in Court ratified the cruelty exercised against Winston and the victims of Copiapó: they were massacred.

For the first time, we spoke as a family about the pain that his absence meant and we were able to cry in front of each other. I also relived our history of hopes, dreams, and truncated projects. I think that in the long run, this was very beneficial for everyone.”

How do you feel today regarding what you did and, finally, achieved?

“I think that what was achieved is so great that the sadness and frustrations of the last few years lost importance. The trial itself is a symbol of hope for humanity, because it restores dignity to Winston Cabello and all the victims of Pinochet’s dictatorship.”

More Than One Death

What was your brother Winston like? How do you remember him?

“Winston was handsome and had a cheerful spirit. He had an easy, welcoming smile, smiling eyes. Despite being quiet and solitary, it was very easy to become friends with him. He was very sensitive and had a conciliatory character.

My childhood, adolescence, and university years are very connected to him. I studied economics because Winston transmitted his enthusiasm to me. He was always my protector. There are testimonies from people who were detained with him who say that he kept his spirit high and that he gave everyone words of support and hope.”

How did his death affect the family?

“As a child, Winston was very close to my father. They liked to play folk songs on the guitar. They also shared a passion for chess, ping-pong, and soccer. With his death, our family not only lost a brother, because in spirit my father also died.

He never smiled again. His guitar went silent forever, and until he passed away in 1990, the same question hovered in his sad gaze: ‘Why did they kill my son?’”

How did you manage to have the American justice system prosecute Fernández Larios?

“It was a combination of things. The laws to do so have existed for many years. One since 1789 and the other, the Torture Victim Protection Act, is from March 1992. However, very few people know about them.

The first was created to protect against pirates. Then it was reinterpreted in 1980 and today it includes the crimes of torture, genocide, war crimes, summary executions, arbitrary detention, and cruel and inhuman treatment.

Its application does not require that the events occurred in the United States. It was thanks to these laws and the NGO Center for Justice and Accountability, whose objective is to pursue war criminals living in the United States, that I managed to prosecute him.”

The conviction of Fernández Larios sets a precedent: it is the first time that a person has been convicted for crimes against humanity. How was this conviction achieved and what relevance do you assign to it?

“It is indeed very relevant; from now on, the United States is obligated to pay more attention to international laws. Furthermore, it constitutes a clear message to the rest of the world: if a country does not want to or cannot pursue its own criminals, whether for political reasons or otherwise, the international community will do so.

Criminals accused of crimes against humanity will no longer be able to use the United States as a ‘retirement paradise,’ as they had done until now.”

You recently carried out efforts in Chile related to Fernández Larios. What did those proceedings consist of?

“I made inquiries to see if there is a possibility of extraditing him for his responsibility in the crime of General Carlos Prats and his wife. Unfortunately, a trial in Chile would not be successful because there is an agreement between the American State Department and this individual that prevents his extradition to Chile. Efforts must be directed toward extraditing him to Argentina.”

You have stated that Chile has not wanted to look for the culprits. Who is responsible for the impunity in our country?

“There are many responsible parties. There is no political will to achieve justice; a very large percentage of Chilean society is also not interested in the subject; and the Armed Forces, of course, find it convenient to wipe the slate clean.

The fight against impunity tends to be seen as a ‘nuisance or sacrifice’ that puts the stability and success of present-day Chile at risk. In this context, it is easy to justify impunity and not prosecute those responsible for the crimes of the Pinochet dictatorship.

This struggle is an ethical problem that must be faced regardless of the difficulties. As long as there are people willing to ‘sacrifice’ the comfort of their present lives for a more humane and dignified future, there will be hope. The trial of Armando Fernández Larios is a good example: it is possible to achieve justice after 30 years, despite all the barriers.”

Source: Punto Final No. 599, October 23, 2011

Supreme Court Requests Extradition of Former DINA Agent Armando Fernández Larios

The Army officer (Ret.) has resided in Miami since 1987, where he leads a life of luxury.

The Supreme Court declared it appropriate to request from the U.S. the extradition of Army officer (Ret.) Armando Fernández Larios, prosecuted in Chile for the crimes of kidnapping and qualified homicide of Manuel Sanhueza Mellado, perpetrated in July 1974.

According to judicial sources, in a unanimous ruling, the country’s highest court granted the request of investigating judge Mario Carroza after establishing that the requirements for extradition are met in the case.

“It is declared appropriate to require the government of the United States to extradite the Chilean citizen Armando Fernández Larios for the responsibility attributed to him as the author of the crimes of aggravated kidnapping and qualified homicide committed against the person of Manuel Sanhueza Mellado on July 10, 1974.”

Part of the text explains that the illicit acts were committed “in a context of serious, massive, and systematic human rights violations, verified by State agents,” during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

Larios also participated in the preparations for the assassination of former Foreign Minister and Minister of the Interior Orlando Letelier, murdered in Washington in 1976 with a bomb that exploded under his car.

The former officer negotiated his surrender to American judicial authorities and in 1987 turned himself in to an FBI agent in Brazil, who transferred him to the United States, where he allegedly negotiated that he would never be extradited to Chile and that at the end of his sentence he would be allowed to live and work in the northern country.

This is not the first extradition request for Larios made to the American justice system. An Argentine tribunal also did so for the assassination of the former commander-in-chief of the Army, Carlos Prats, murdered along with his wife by a bomb that exploded in their car in a neighborhood of Buenos Aires.

Source: elmostrador.cl, July 13, 2017

DINA Leader Prosecuted for Crime of Ronni Moffitt in the United States in 1976

The minister in extraordinary visitation for human rights violation cases of the Santiago Court of Appeals, Paola Plaza González, subjected former Army general and leader of the defunct National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, to prosecution as the author of the consummated crime of qualified homicide of American citizen Ronni Karpen Moffitt, 25 years of age, perpetrated in the city of Washington DC on September 21, 1976.

In the case (file 910-2211), former Army officers Pedro Octavio Espinoza Bravo, Armando Fernández Larios, and the American civil DINA agent Michael Vernon Townley Welch have also been prosecuted since June 2016 as authors of the homicide of the secretary of former Chilean Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier, in a terrorist attack carried out in the capital of the United States.

All those involved operated as leaders and agents of the DINA.

It has been proven in the process that the DINA organized and carried out a series of attacks against the lives of Chilean citizens who were outside the national territory. As part of that criminal plan, they planned to carry out the execution of Orlando Letelier, former Foreign Minister of the Salvador Allende government, who resided in Washington.

The planning included the cooperation of the Paraguayan dictatorship to provide false passports to the Chilean agents for the purpose of entering United States territory illegally, for which Fernández Larios traveled to Paraguay.

Meanwhile, Michael Townley was in charge of contacting a Cuban anti-Castro group called the Cuban Nationalist Movement to carry out tracking and surveillance on Orlando Letelier. The former Chilean Foreign Minister was working at that time at the Institute for Policy Studies, located in the District of Columbia.

The terrorist organization of the anti-Castro Cubans dedicated itself to establishing Letelier’s routines and obtaining the logistical resources to carry out the attack.

On September 18, 1976, the entire operational team moved to the vicinity of Orlando Letelier del Solar’s residence to focus on reconnaissance of the area, analysis of routines, and review of movements, and then reported the results to Lieutenant Colonel Pedro Espinoza Bravo, in charge of controlling the operation.

With the information confirmed, Espinoza Bravo issued the order to perpetrate the attack by installing a bomb; the explosive device was placed under the former Chilean Foreign Minister’s car.

On September 21, when Orlando Letelier, along with his secretary Ronnie Karpen Moffitt and her spouse, was heading to work, the operational group detonated the device, causing the immediate death of Letelier and Ronnie Moffitt. Ronnie’s spouse survived the criminal attack.

The person in charge of the so-called foreign department of the DINA for 1976 was Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann who, given the internal and hierarchical structure with which the repressive entity acted, exercised direct management and control of these criminal actions.

From the selection of the operational officers in charge of the operation, the preparation of the acts, the agents, the necessary means, and the control of the operations passed through the hands of Iturriaga Neumann, or “Don Elías,” as he called himself, who reported to his superiors Espinoza Bravo and Manuel Contreras, the director of the DINA.

Iturriaga Neumann is serving a sentence for another series of crimes against humanity in which he had participation and direct responsibility. Among these, he is serving a sentence as the author of the assassination of General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert in Buenos Aires in September 1974, to a penalty of 15 years and 1 day of major imprisonment in its maximum degree, and as the author of illicit association to a penalty of 100 days of minor imprisonment in its minimum degree.

Additionally, he has final convictions of 5 years and 1 day as the author of the qualified kidnapping of Luis Dagoberto San Martín Vergara; 5 years and 1 day as co-author of the qualified kidnappings of Mario Edrulfo Carrasco Díaz and Víctor Fernando Olea Alegría; 3 years of minor imprisonment in its medium degree as author of the qualified kidnapping of Félix De la Jara Goyeneche; and 3 years and 1 day as co-author of 3 qualified kidnappings of Luis Genaro González Mella, Luis Omar Mahuida Esquivel, and Antonio Patricio Soto Cerna.

He is also prosecuted and accused in the “Operation Colombo” case as the author of the qualified kidnappings of Mario Fernando Peña Solari and Nilda Patricia Peña Solari; and as co-author of the qualified kidnapping of Jorge Arturo Grez Aburto. And he is prosecuted as co-author of 38 qualified kidnappings in 25 case files, both in the Operation Colombo case and in other cases.

Source: resumen.cl, June 9, 2022

Dictatorship Papers: Unpublished Images of DINA Agents’ Passports DOCUMENTS WERE IN AN OLD FOLDER OF THE PDI HOMICIDE BRIGADE by Mauricio Weibel Barahona

Copies of the official passports, with their respective photographs, of 44 agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) appeared in an old folder of the PDI Homicide Brigade. Those records are now part of the 4,000 documents available online on the “Dictatorship Papers” platform developed by CIPER with the collaboration of CIP UDP.

The security agency that operated in the first years of the dictatorship—responsible for kidnappings, torture, executions, and disappearances—carried out numerous operations abroad, such as the attacks against General Carlos Prats and former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier. See the images of the passports here.

There are 44 black-and-white photographs that put a face to the terror instilled by the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA). Images of serious faces and formal attire—only two correspond to women—that could well be professionals, businessmen, or bank employees.

But no. They are agents of the organization that carried out kidnappings, torture, murders, and disappearances in the first years of the dictatorship. They were registered in the official passports that the Civil Registry gave them when the DINA operated in secret barracks and carried out covert operations abroad.

Some of those operations ended in crimes; others were for observation or technical assistance to embassies, within the framework of the regime’s so-called External War Plan.

The passports were archived in a folder of the PDI Homicide Brigade, probably when the DINA’s crimes began to be investigated in the 90s, after the return to democracy. A record that fell into oblivion until now, in the framework of the 50 years since the coup d'état, it was compiled and reviewed by the Center for Journalistic Research and Projects of the Universidad Diego Portales (CIP UDP).

Now, that folder is part of “Dictatorship Papers,” a platform with more than 4,000 documents available online developed by CIPER with the collaboration of CIP UDP.

It was precisely one of the operations carried out by DINA agents abroad, and which must have required the use of some of these passports, that ended up burying that repressive organization: the bomb attack that murdered former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier and his secretary Ronni Moffitt in Washington DC, near the White House.

The pressure exerted by the United States for that criminal action was decisive for the dictatorship to bring down the curtain on the DINA. Its duties were inherited by the National Intelligence Center (CNI).

CIPER reviewed the judicial processes opened for crimes committed by the DINA and verified that at least 20 agents, out of the 44 that appeared in the passport folder, are linked to those cases. This report shows those backgrounds. The passports of the other 18 agents can be reviewed in “Dictatorship Papers.”

Armando Fernández Larios

Army officer who participated in the assault on La Moneda and the Caravan of Death. Later, he joined the DINA and was linked to the attack on Orlando Letelier in Washington. In 1987, he retired from the Army and traveled to the United States, where he admitted his participation in the crime of the former Chilean Foreign Minister.

Currently, he lives in the United States under the witness protection system. In 2003, the civil justice system of the state of Florida found Armando Fernández Larios responsible for the torture and extrajudicial killing of economist Winston Cabello, murdered in Copiapó, imposing a compensation payment of four million dollars.

For more information on the Letelier case and the situation of Fernández Larios, you can review the report.

Source: ciper.cl, August 30, 2023