Disappearance of the PS Political Commission

In June and early July 1975, the entire Political Commission directing the Central Committee of the PS was detained. Along with them, their liaisons and couriers were apprehended. It is very difficult to specify, in some cases with absolute certainty, the dates on which they were detained because they were living in clandestinity.

Prior to June 24, 1975, Ricardo Ernesto LAGOS SALINAS, 24, an accountant and member of the Political Commission of the Central Committee of the PS, was detained. He had been a leader of the party's youth wing and had to assume positions of greater relevance and responsibility because several of the senior leaders had left the country.

He was living in clandestinity. He was detained by DINA agents before the indicated date, as there is evidence that on that day he was taken in a car by his captors to detain another member of the PS.

This Commission obtained various testimonies, all consistent in time and place, that the victim remained at Villa Grimaldi and was in poor physical condition as a result of torture.

The writs of amparo filed on his behalf were all unsuccessful, fundamentally because the authorities of the time stated that he was not being held in detention. The investigation carried out by a visiting judge concluded with a declaration of incompetence and the transfer of this case to the Military Justice system.

The Commission formed the conviction that Ricardo Ernesto Lagos was the victim of human rights violations attributable to state agents, who caused him to be forcibly disappeared.

Two or three days after the detention of Ricardo Lagos, with whom she lived, Michelle PEÑA HERREROS, 27, a university student and PS militant, who was in her eighth month of pregnancy, was apprehended.

Witnesses deemed credible by this Commission have stated that Michelle Peña, despite her state of pregnancy, was in La Torre at Villa Grimaldi in July 1975. Since that date, nothing has been known of her.

The Commission is convinced that her disappearance was the work of state agents, who thereby violated her human rights.