31 years old, married, farmer, forcibly disappeared on October 9, 1974, in Temuco. Elidoro Figueroa González was detained that day, around 14:30 hours, at his home in the town of Campo Conoco Chico, located between Temuco and Chol-Chol, by a group of Carabineros and civilians, and his whereabouts have remained unknown since then.

According to testimonies received, Eliodoro Figueroa was detained together with a coworker, and both were taken to the Chol-Chol Carabineros station; the latter was released the following day, while Figueroa González remained in detention and his arrest was denied to his family members.

Considering the evidence gathered and the investigations carried out, the Superior Council of this Corporation reached the conviction that Eliodoro Figueroa González, while in detention, was made to disappear by State agents. For this reason, it declared him a victim of human rights violations.

Source: Corporation Report

The Supreme Court issued a final judgment in the investigation into the qualified kidnapping of Eliodoro Figueroa González, which occurred beginning in October 1973 in the town of Chol-Chol, La Araucanía Region.

In a split decision (in case file 4531-2008), justices Nibaldo Segura, Jaime Rodríguez, Rubén Ballesteros, Hugo Dolmestch, and Carlos Künsemüller established the following sentence: Eugenio Caifual Lemuñir : 3 years of imprisonment.

The benefit of conditional remission of the sentence was granted. Justices Rodríguez, Dolmestch, and Künsemüller were in favor of applying the conviction in the case; meanwhile, magistrates Segura and Ballesteros were in favor of applying the statute of limitations and acquitting the defendants.

It should be noted that, in the first instance, the visiting judge Fernando Carreño Ortega had been in favor of sentencing the convicted individual to 5 years and one day of imprisonment, without benefits, a sentence ratified by the Temuco Court of Appeals. This is the eighth Supreme Court judgment in a human rights violation case in 2009 and the 51st since the year 2005.

Source: poderjudicial.cl, March 26, 2009

Date: 03-26-2009