In a ruling that will have significant repercussions for human rights cases, the Seventh Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals ordered the release of thirteen uniformed officers and revoked their indictments, concluding that the principle of res judicata and the Amnesty Law applied.

The ruling states that there is no merit to maintain the indictments against thirteen personnel who belonged to the Comando Conjunto and who were prosecuted by the head of the 25th Criminal Court, Carlos Hazbún, who serves as a judge with preferential dedication.

This follows the decision on May 2 by the head of the First Civil Court of San Bernardo, Cecilia Flores, to declare herself incompetent to hear the case regarding the kidnapping of David Urrutia Galaz, who was captured by Comando Conjunto agents in 1975, and referred the case files to the judge of the 25th Criminal Court of Santiago, Carlos Hazbún.

The defense for the former uniformed officers, led by lawyer Carlos Portales, stated that the resolution opens the door to follow the same path for the remaining fifty or so military personnel currently being prosecuted by judges with exclusive dedication to these cases.

According to El Mercurio, the Human Rights Program of the Ministry of the Interior ordered a special meeting for tomorrow with all its lawyers to analyze the new scenario. The director of the agency, Luciano Fouillioux, indicated that the final word regarding the application of the principle of res judicata and the Amnesty Law lies with the Supreme Court.

This is because it is the first time that an appellate court has applied a ruling of this nature in human rights violation cases investigated by special judges appointed as a result of the "Dialogue Table."

The head of the 25th Criminal Court of Santiago, Carlos Hazbún, had indicted the uniformed officers César Palma Ramírez, Otto Trujillo Miranda, Raúl González Fernández, and Manuel Muñoz Gamboa on January 7, 2002, as perpetrators of "illicit criminal association."

Likewise, the indictment included retired FACh (Chilean Air Force) non-commissioned officer Pedro Caamaño Medina; retired commander of the FACh Colina regiment Carlos Madrid Hayden; active FACh non-commissioned officer Robinson Suazo Jaque; retired FACh non-commissioned officer Fernando Zúñiga Canales; retired FACh non-commissioned officer Eduardo Cartagena Maldonado; retired Navy lieutenant Daniel Guimper Corvalán; retired FACh non-commissioned officer Guillermo Urra Carrasco; retired FACh non-commissioned officer Pedro Zambrano Uribe; and retired FACh non-commissioned officer Juan Chávez Sandoval, all of whom have now benefited from this provision.

Source: Sunday, June 16, 2002, El Mostrador

Comando Conjunto agent "funado" (publicly denounced)

Puerto Montt has become a true paradise for the former murderers, torturers, and informants of the dictatorship's repressive agencies, who seek the tranquility of the province to conduct their business.

After locating him thanks to a publication by El Siglo, about twenty members of the Communist Party and independent activists participated in a Funa (public protest/denunciation) against former Comando Conjunto member Raúl González Fernández—alias "El Wally Chico"—who participated in the kidnapping and disappearance of the former deputy general secretary of the Communist Youth, José Weibel, and in the kidnapping of Amanda Velasco.

The activity took place on Saturday, October 19, when the group of people went to the Radio Taxi Volcanes company, located at Calle Doctor Martin No. 459, phone numbers 313131 and 313989, in the capital of the Tenth Region, with the goal of denouncing the activities of this "businessman."

The protesters handed out pamphlets to passersby and shouted slogans against the former agent, in addition to posting photographs of González outside the premises currently occupied by the aforementioned taxi company, which is composed of other former members of the repressive agencies.

"We do not want these individuals to breathe the same air as the people of Puerto Montt. We know that at least two other people linked to the Comando Conjunto or the CNI work at that company. We are going to work to identify them and funarlos.

We are also going to establish the Funa on a more permanent basis, inviting more people, political parties, and young people who want to participate," said one of the organizers.

The following Monday, the criminal González appeared with his head shaved and without his mustache, after the protest denouncing his presence in this southern city caused great concern within his company, which, despite not appearing in the phone book, provides services to the Coca-Cola distribution branch, the newspaper El Mercurio, and the local newspaper El Llanquihue.

Another fact to highlight is that General Patricio Campos, at that time commander of the Third Air Brigade based at El Tepual Airport, was also in Puerto Montt, as was his wife, Viviana Ugarte, alias "La Pochi," who also participated in the kidnapping of José Weibel.

From Puerto Montt, we also say: If there is no justice... there is a FUNA.

Source: elsiglo.cl, October 28, 2002

20 former CNI agents convicted for 1983 Calle Fuente Ovejuna crimes

The minister on extraordinary assignment for human rights violation cases of the Santiago Court of Appeals, Mario Carroza Espinoza, handed down a sentence against 20 former agents of the National Intelligence Center (CNI) for their responsibility in the qualified homicides of former militants and leaders of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR) Lucía Orfilia Vergara Valenzuela, Arturo Vilavella Araujo, and Sergio Peña Díaz, crimes perpetrated on September 7, 1983, on Calle Fuenteovejuna in the Las Condes commune.

The event was an episode of a staged confrontation with which the CNI and the dictatorship attempted to hide crimes and murders, with the active complicity of the corporate press. In the ruling (case file 539-2011), Minister Carroza sentenced former Army Brigadier Roberto Urbano Schmied Zanzi, former head of the CNI's Metropolitan Division, to 15 years and one day in prison as the perpetrator of the qualified homicides.

Meanwhile, former Army officers Aquiles Mauricio González Cortés, alias "Caracha," former head of the Blue Brigade at the time of the crimes; Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, former head of the CNI's anti-subversive division; Norman Antonio Jeldes Aguilar, alias "Gorilón," former member of the Special Brigade; and former Army civilian employee Manuel Mariano Ventura Laureada Núñez, alias "Piolín," also an agent of the Special Brigade, were sentenced to 10 years and one day as perpetrators of the crimes.

In the same case, former Army officer and Schmied Zanzi's second-in-command in the Metropolitan Division, Sergio María Canals Baldwin, and former agents Juan José Pastene Osses, Patricio Leonidas González Cortez, Luis René Torres Méndez, Manuel Ángel Morales Acevedo, Luis Hernán Gálvez Navarro, Sergio Daniel Valenzuela Morales, Juan Modesto Olivares Carrizo, Raúl Hernán Escobar Díaz, Eduardo Martín Chávez Baeza, Luis Eduardo Burgos Cofré, Raúl Horacio González Fernández, Orlando Jesús Torrejón Gatica, Rafael de Jesús Riveros Frost, and Juan Alejandro Jorquera Abarzúa were sentenced to 3 years and one day in prison, with the benefit of intensive supervised release, as accomplices.

Meanwhile, former Special Brigade agent Egon Antonio Barra Barra, alias "Siete Fachas," was acquitted of participation in this episode (the group he was part of was simultaneously committing other crimes on Calle Janequeo).

Blue Brigade During the investigation phase of the case, Minister Mario Carroza established that, following the assassination of the Intendant of the Metropolitan Region Carol Urzúa Ibañez, committed on August 30, 1983, the director of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), Humberto Gordon Rubio (deceased), ordered the Metropolitan Anti-Subversive Division, under the command of Roberto Schmied Zanzi, to form a new group: the Blue Brigade, to investigate the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR).

In this context, on the morning of September 7, 1983, the arrest of MIR members who were in the property at Fuenteovejuna 1330, which had been previously located, was ordered. In the afternoon, a considerable number of agents under the command of Álvaro Corbalán Castilla (commander of the Metropolitan Anti-Subversive Brigade) and Aquiles González Cortés (head of the Blue Brigade) were sent to the location.

"In the initial actions, the agents installed a firing base in front of the property, consisting of a 7.62 mm Rheinmetal machine gun mounted on the roof of a jeep, which was driven on that occasion by Manuel Ventura Laureada Núñez, and the weapon was operated by at least two people, one who fired, Norman Antonio Jeldes Aguilar, and the other in charge of feeding the ammunition belt, with a firing capacity of 10 rounds per short burst and a full firing capacity of 500 rounds per minute, with tracer bullets," the ruling states.

The resolution adds that

"once the firing base was in position, the officer in command ordered it to be aimed and fired at the property for nearly a minute, that is, about 500 shots; they then stopped their action and, using loudspeakers, ordered the occupants of the property to surrender."

"One of them," it continues, "Sergio Peña Díaz, decided to surrender and came out with his hands behind his neck, but as he walked toward the agents, they shot him and his wounds caused his death, which incited the reaction of the only woman in the group, who confronted them with a weapon; faced with this reaction, Álvaro Corbalán again gave the order to fire the firing base in the direction of the property, which caused not only the death of Lucía Orfilia Vergara Valenzuela from gunshot wounds, but also the burning of the house and the incineration of the third member of the movement, Arturo Vilavella Araujo."

On the same day, September 7, 1983, the CNI carried out a simultaneous operation on Calle Janequeo, in Quinta Normal, where two other MIR militants were executed.

This episode, however, is being prosecuted in a separate case and by a different visiting minister.

Source: resumen.cl, January 18, 2018

Supreme Court confirms convictions of 27 former Comando Conjunto agents for crimes against five Communist militants committed between 1975 and 1976

The Supreme Court rejected the cassation appeals filed by the defense teams of the former agents of the so-called Comando Conjunto against the sentence that convicted 27 of them for their responsibility in the crimes of simple kidnapping and qualified homicide of Ignacio Orlando González Espinoza and Juan René Orellana Catalán; and in the qualified kidnappings of Ricardo Manuel Weibel Navarrete, Luis Desiderio Moraga Cruz, and Luis Emilio Gerardo Maturana González, all militants of the Communist Party.

The crimes were perpetrated between October 1975 and June 1976 in the city of Santiago.

The so-called Comando Conjunto was a repressive apparatus created by the dictatorship under the tutelage of the Air Force (FACh) and with the participation of agents from the Army, Navy, Carabineros, and civilian collaborators, which operated mainly between 1975 and 1977.

Its reason for being was to compete in repressive and criminal tasks with the absolute power held by the DINA under the tutelage of the Army and the direction of Pinochet and Contreras.

In a unanimous ruling (case file 32.012-2022), the Second Chamber of the high court—composed of ministers Manuel Antonio Valderrama, Jorge Dahm, Leopoldo Llanos, minister María Teresa Letelier, and minister Jean Pierre Matus—confirmed the challenged sentence, issued by the Santiago Court of Appeals, which sentenced former FACh officer Juan Francisco Saavedra Loyola and former Carabineros officer Manuel Agustín Muñoz Gamboa to 18 years in prison, plus 13 years, plus 3 years in prison, each.

Former Navy officer Daniel Luis Enrique Guimpert Corvalán was sentenced to 18 years, plus 12 years, plus 3 years in prison.

Former Army officers Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla and Sergio Antonio Díaz López, and former Navy officer Jorge Aníbal Osses Novoa, were sentenced to 12 years in prison, plus 10 years and one day, plus 400 days in prison each.

Agents Raúl Horacio González Fernández and Alejandro Julio Segundo Sáez Mardones were each given two sentences of 10 years and one day in prison, plus 400 days in prison.

Agents Roberto Alfonso Flores Cisterna and Juan Carlos Hernán Rodrigo Villarreal were each sentenced to 10 years and one day, plus 5 years and one day, plus 400 days in prison.

Civilian collaborator Otto Silvio Trujillo Miranda was sentenced to 10 years and one day in prison. Agent Lenin Figueroa Sánchez was given two sentences of 5 years and one day, plus 400 days in prison.

Agents Sergio Daniel Valenzuela Morales and Juan Atilio Aravena Hurtuvia were sentenced to 5 years and one day in prison, plus 5 years, plus 400 days in prison.

Civilian collaborators Andrés Pablo Potín Lailhacar, Viviana Lucinda Ugarte Sandoval, and Emilio Mahias del Río, and agents Juan Luis Fernando López López, José Evaristo Rojas Alruiz, and Francisco Segundo Illanes Miranda were sentenced to 5 years and one day in prison, plus 400 days in prison.

Ernesto Arturo Lobos Gálvez and Alejandro Jorge Forero Álvarez were sentenced to 5 years and one day in prison, plus 60 days in prison.

Roberto Francisco Serón Cárdenas was sentenced to 5 years and one day in prison. Robinson Alfonso Suazo Jaque, Pedro Ernesto Caamaño Medina, Pedro Juan Zambrano Uribe, and José Hernando Alvarado Alvarado were each sentenced to 4 years, plus 60 days in prison.

The other convicted individuals, Antonio Benedicto Quiros Reyes and Miguel Arturo Estay Reyno, died during the course of the trial.

In the judicial investigation and first-instance ruling, Minister Miguel Vásquez Plaza established that there existed a de facto group that operated clandestinely between 1975 and 1976, composed mainly of agents who belonged to the Air Force Intelligence Directorate, in addition to Carabineros de Chile, the Navy, and the Army, with the collaboration of civilians, whose main objective was the repression of the Communist Party Youth, for which they proceeded to arrest several of them.

This group, called Comando Conjunto, used various facilities for arrests and torture: the Cerrillos Hangar; Nido 20, a secret detention and torture center located at Calle Santa Teresa No. 037, at the 20th stop of Gran Avenida; Nido 18, a secret center located at Calle Perú No. 9053, La Florida, Santiago, which was used exclusively for torture; "La Prevención" or "Remo Cero," which were dungeons located inside the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, all during 1975; and "La Firma," at the beginning of 1976, when the group moved its operations to the back of a property under the control of Carabineros de Chile, located on Calle Dieciocho, opposite No. 229, which had belonged to the former newspaper Clarín.

The operational modus operandi of the group consisted of arresting people via kidnapping, keeping them captive in secret centers, and subjecting them to interrogation and physical and psychological torture to obtain information and break their will, achieving the collaboration of some of them to the point that some were assimilated as operational agents of the group, which provided greater effectiveness in the chain arrest of Communist militants, who were then forcibly disappeared; for some of them, parts of their remains were found over the years.

On November 7, 1975, at approximately 10:00 PM, Ricardo Manuel Weibel Navarrete was arrested at his home on Calle Río Maule in the Recoleta commune by subjects dressed in civilian clothes; he was kept deprived of liberty at the facility called "La Prevención" or "Remo Cero," located inside the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, the last place he was seen alive.

Subsequently, his skeletal remains were found on the grounds of Fuerte Arteaga, Peldehue.

On October 20, 1975, in the early morning, Luis Desiderio Moraga Cruz was arrested at his home on Pasaje Tokio in the Población Juanita Aguirre, Conchalí commune, Santiago, by subjects dressed in civilian clothes; he was held at the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, inside which was the facility called "La Prevención" or "Remo Cero," which was the last place he was seen alive.

On December 4, 1975, in the early morning, Ignacio Orlando González Espinoza was arrested at his home on Calle Soberanía in the Santiago commune by subjects dressed in civilian clothes; he was kept deprived of liberty at the facility called "La Prevención" or "Remo Cero," located inside the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, the last place he was seen alive.

He was subsequently executed on the grounds of Fuerte Arteaga, Peldehue, where his skeletal remains were found.

On June 8, 1976, in the Estación Central sector, Luis Emilio Gerardo Maturana González met with Juan René Orellana Catalán, both militants of the Communist Youth in hiding due to the political persecution they were facing, for the purpose of delivering party money to Orellana Catalán for himself and for him to deliver to other party militants, as Maturana González was in charge of distributing it.

At that moment, they were arrested by operational agents of the aforementioned Comando Conjunto and held at the facility called "La Firma," from where their trail was lost. Subsequently, Orellana Catalán was executed at Cuesta Barriga, where his remains were found.

Source: resumen.cl, April 26, 2024