Seven retired members of the Navy were convicted for the kidnapping of Haitian citizen Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, who remains forcibly disappeared to this day after being tortured for his political orientation during the dictatorship.

Six of the seven were sentenced to 15 years in prison. In addition, a multi-million peso indemnity must be paid to the victim's family. The Valparaíso Court of Appeals sentenced seven retired Navy members to prison for their responsibility in the crime of kidnapping a Dominican citizen during the military dictatorship.

Regarding the civil aspect, the ruling upheld the lawsuit filed by the relatives and ordered the state treasury to pay an indemnity of $150 billion [pesos] for moral damages to the victim's father. Furthermore, $75 million pesos were awarded to a brother.

The sentences The court sentenced Ernesto Huber von Appen, Wilfredo Zepeda Iturriaga, Víctor Rey Ringele, Jaime Urdangarín Romero, Arístides León Calffas, and Germán Valdivia Keller to 15 years in prison.

All of them are retired members of the Navy, responsible for the crime of kidnapping the Dominican citizen Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo. Meanwhile, Jorge Ginouvés Contreras was sentenced to 5 years in prison, with the benefit of supervised release, as a co-author of the crime.

Kidnapping of a Dominican man during the military dictatorship

The events date back to September 1973 in the city of Villa Alemana. There, due to his political orientation, the 25-year-old Dominican citizen was detained and held in different centers, where he was tortured.

Since then, until today, his whereabouts remain unknown. This was detailed by the judge in charge of human rights violation cases, Max Cancino, who specified that it was Navy officials who detained him and took him to a police station for interrogation. "Finally, he was removed from that place by Navy officials to an unknown destination," he noted.

The judge also granted all of them absolute perpetual disqualification from public offices and positions, political rights, and professional titles for the duration of their sentences.

Lawsuit Criminal lawyer and professor at the University of Valparaíso, Felipe González, explained that in this case, in an unprecedented move, the State of the Dominican Republic sued Chile over the events.

However, the court ultimately dismissed it. In the civil aspect, the ruling upheld the lawsuit filed by the family of Juan Blanco. Thus, it ordered the state treasury to pay an indemnity of $150 billion [pesos] for moral damages to the victim's father. Additionally, $75 million pesos to a brother.

Source: biobiochile.cl, November 3, 2022

In a matter of days, or perhaps only hours, the special judge Gabriela Corti is expected to decree the prosecution of four former Navy officers as responsible for the "aggravated kidnapping" of the former CCU comptroller, Limache councilman, civil engineer, and journalist Jaime Aldoney Vargas, brother of the former intendant of Valparaíso, Gabriel Aldoney.

The indictments were requested on October 25 by lawyer and parliamentarian Juan Bustos, one of the plaintiffs in this case, and are based on a large amount of evidence that establishes full conviction of responsibility in the kidnapping by the now-retired Navy officers Ernesto Huber von Hapen, Patricio Villalobos Lobos, Manuel Bush López, and Pedro Pablo Aracibia.

In his request, lawyer Bustos asks to prosecute the five retired officers for violation of Article 274 of the Penal Code; that is, for aggravated kidnapping of Jaime Aldoney, an event recorded on September 12, 1973, in Limache and El Belloto, in the commune of Quilpué.

Aldoney was detained by the Carabineros of Limache at the CCU plant on September 12, 1973, the day after the military coup. He was tortured at the local police station and then sent to the El Belloto Naval Air Base, where he was also subjected to torture by Navy personnel who have been fully identified.

At the naval facility, he was seen by numerous detained witnesses and Navy personnel who have testified to having seen him severely injured, in a practically agonizing state. Witnesses and sources close to the case have maintained to this news site that on September 14, 1973, Aldoney was not only in grave condition due to the effects of the torture but also suffering from pneumonitis, a product of his long stay outdoors without shelter.

Under such circumstances, and with a medical report declaring him terminal, he was loaded onto a small plane (some claim it was a helicopter) while he was still alive. He reportedly passed away during the journey from Quilpué to the coast, off the coast of Concón, where he was allegedly thrown into the sea.

Source: Piensachile.com, November 22, 2002

Five retired Navy officers prosecuted for an emblematic case in the Fifth Region

After a year of investigation, special judge Gabriela Corti yesterday prosecuted five retired Navy officers and one civilian as alleged perpetrators of the aggravated kidnapping of engineer Jaime Aldoney (PS), who has been a forcibly disappeared person since September 12, 1973.

The case is emblematic for human rights groups in the Fifth Region, as it is one of the few crimes in which Navy personnel are linked to its execution. It also impacts the Navy because, unlike the Army and the Air Force, it only had a couple of retired officers prosecuted for human rights violations, related to actions of the Comando Conjunto.

Those charged yesterday are Rear Admiral (R) Ernesto Huber Von Appen, Lieutenants (R) Sergio Iván Mendoza Rojas, Patricio Maximiliano Villalobos Lobos, Pedro Pablo Arancibia Solar, and Jaime Ondargarín Romero, and former corporal Manuel Bush López, currently an official of the Quilpué Municipality.

The former uniformed officers were transported yesterday under the custody of Navy officials and in a vehicle belonging to that institution to the Limache Criminal Court, where they were notified by the magistrate of the indictment.

The deputies and plaintiff lawyers, Laura Soto (PPD) and Juan Bustos (PS), and the victim's brother, Gabriel Aldoney, director of the Port Company of Valparaíso, also attended the scene, criticizing the Navy for providing "institutional support" to the accused and calling on it to cooperate in the case. "We ask that it be the Navy that, in a real gesture toward the country, recognizes the truth and finally tells the family where the remains of Jaime Aldoney are," stated Laura Soto.

In the military branch, there was no comment on the matter yesterday. However, the Commander-in-Chief, Miguel Angel Vergara—who is in Korea—noted last September regarding the eventual prosecution of the officers that "if the conviction is reached that they must be convicted, we regret it, but justice must be served."

Support from Senator Arancibia

The former Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, UDI Senator Jorge Arancibia, stated yesterday that the retired officers "as long as they are not found guilty, will have my sympathy, my backing, and my support if necessary." The parliamentarian noted that Rear Admiral Huber "is a friend of mine; I feel a double sentiment seeing a person of such standing in that situation.

I trust that justice will manage to clear up the doubts." Arancibia added that when he was in the Navy, he did everything possible to find more information about Aldoney, but without success. Jaime Aldoney was a journalism student and comptroller of the CCU when he was detained by Carabineros in 1973.

According to testimonies from the time, from the Limache police station, he was taken by Navy personnel to the El Belloto naval air base—which was under Huber's command—where he was tortured and his trail was lost.

Witnesses claim to have seen his corpse on September 26 at the morgue of the Deforme Hospital in Valparaíso. In search of his remains, Judge Corti carried out fruitless excavations in Colliguay last year.

Source: latercera.cl, June 12, 2003

Freedom granted to four prosecuted in the Aldoney case

The First Chamber of the Court of Appeals, in a unanimous ruling, granted provisional release to four of the six people prosecuted for the disappearance of the former CCU comptroller in the Fifth Region, Jaime Aldoney Vargas.

Those benefiting from the judicial resolution are Rear Admiral (R) Ernesto Huber Von Appen; Navy Captains (R) Sergio Mendoza and Patricio Villalobos; and Petty Officer (R) Manuel Buch López. Meanwhile, civilian Jaime Undargarín and Navy Captain (R) Pedro Pablo Arancibia Soler remain detained.

Jaime Aldoney, a socialist militant and civil engineer, was detained on September 12, 1973, in Limache and transferred to the El Belloto naval air base by Navy personnel. There, he was subjected to torture and his trail was lost.

Source: elmostrador.cl, August 25, 2003

Court releases authors of the crime against former councilman Jaime Aldoney

The Valparaíso Court of Appeals applied such low sentences that the seven convicted will serve them in freedom. The Third Chamber of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals did not apply international criminal law, which declares crimes against humanity non-amnestiable and imprescriptible, and released the seven kidnappers of socialist councilman Jaime Aldoney Vargas, whose body was presumably thrown into the sea by the same released Navy officers.

Judges Manuel Silva Ibáñez and Gonzalo Morales (majority vote) applied the legal criterion of "half-prescription" and applied sentences of three years and 541 days against the six Navy Captains (R)—Patricio Villalobos Lobos, Pedro Arancibia Solar, Jaime Urdangarín Romero, Germán Valdivia Keller, Guillermo Vidal Hurtado, and Sergio Mendoza Rojas—and Rear Admiral (R) Ernesto Huber von Appen.

Since the sentences are less than five years and one day, all those sentenced will serve them in freedom. "Half-prescription" is a "reconciliation" formula, installed two years ago by the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court, which allows for low sentences to be applied to those who committed crimes during the dictatorship.

The sentence was considered "grave and regrettable" by the lawyer for the Ministry of Interior's Human Rights Program, Karina Fernández, a plaintiff in the case: "a type of prescription was applied to human rights violators that allows them to remain free, in a sentence absolutely contradictory to the principles of international law." The lawyer told La Nación that "the Navy did not cooperate in the investigation, which makes it even more unjust," and added that "we will file an appeal for cassation before the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court." Jaime Aldoney, former comptroller of the Compañía de Cervecerías Unidas of Limache and brother of the former intendant of Valparaíso, Gabriel Aldoney, was detained after the 1973 military coup and tortured at the El Belloto naval air base, from where he disappeared.

Source: lanacion.cl, June 10, 2009

Supreme Court convicts 6 Navy members in the Aldoney case

The Supreme Court issued a final sentence in the investigation into the aggravated kidnapping of Jaime Aldoney Vargas, a journalist and former Limache councilman, who was executed starting September 12, 1973, from the El Belloto naval air base.

In a split decision, the judges of the Second Chamber, Nibaldo Segura, Jaime Rodríguez, Rubén Ballesteros, Hugo Dolmestch, and Carlos Künsemüller, determined the sentences, upholding the investigation carried out by the Valparaíso Court of Appeals judge, Julio Miranda Lillo.

The conviction was issued with the dissenting vote of judges Segura and Ballesteros, who were in favor of accepting the statute of limitations for criminal action. The ruling acquitted two of the eight accused in the case due to a lack of participation in the events: retired Rear Admiral Ernesto Huber Von Appen and retired officer Manuel Buch López.

Five of the other accused were sentenced to 5 years in prison with the benefit of supervised release. They are Navy Captains Patricio Villalobos Lobos, Pedro Arancibia Solar, Jaime Urdangarín Romero, and Germán Valdivia Keller.

Captain Guillermo Vidal Hurtado was sentenced to the same term as an accessory, while retired Captain Sergio Mendoza Rojas received only 4 years, also with supervised release. In the civil aspect, it was determined that the convicted Valdivia Keller, Arancibia Solar, Urdangarín Romero, and Mendoza Rojas must pay joint indemnity of $30,000,000 to Gabriel and Iván Aldoney Vargas, the victim's brothers.

Likewise, the lawsuit against the Chilean State was dismissed, accepting the plea of absolute incompetence of the court. In the civil aspect, the decision to accept the exception in favor of the Chilean State was adopted with the dissenting vote of judges Dolmestch and Künsemüller.

Source: lanacion.cl, May 5, 2011

May the Admiral beg for forgiveness on his knees

Since time immemorial, the wind has dwelled in Valparaíso: crouching there among the rocks and the song of the pelicans, caressing the death rattles of first love with its laughter. But on a cold, late winter morning, the laughter ended, the gannets fled the bay in terror, and the sea breeze donned a uniform when the Chilean Navy went out to kill.

And it did so with hatred, in an organized and planned manner, crushing skulls and ribs, streets and dreams alike. Dozens of men and women were tortured aboard the training ship "Esmeralda," among them the priest Miguel Woodward, who died.

Fear and horror enthroned themselves in the city with agonizing screams, with muffled weeping, and with desperate efforts to survive the nightmare established by the dictatorship. But the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy knew nothing of this.

Admiral Miguel Angel Vergara recently asserted, without a hint of shame, that regarding human rights violations, "to be quite honest, I found out quite late." In fact, according to the oblivious admiral, it was as a result of the roundtable dialogue—that is, only a couple of years ago—that he "realized the magnitude of what had happened." However, this supposed late revelation does not constitute sufficient information for the Navy to acknowledge its participation in the repression.

On the contrary, Vergara reiterates what has been the Navy's position for 30 years. Denying any institutional responsibility for what occurred, he resorts, tiresomely, to a double argument: "Under those circumstances, there were people who unfortunately went too far" and, "responsibilities are individual and not institutional." For the same reason, Admiral Vergara does not feel "responsible for anything, unless I knew and had the slightest evidence that the Chilean Navy institution, as a doctrine, had any document mentioning that human rights violations should be imposed.

I would beg for forgiveness on my knees, but there is no evidence to that effect." Well, Admiral. These are the testimonies of men and women detained and tortured by officers and personnel of the Navy, held as prisoners in your institution's facilities.

All of them, unlike you, Mr. Admiral, remember perfectly what happened starting in 1973 in Valparaíso and provide the evidence you require to "beg for forgiveness on my knees," as you so humbly and feelingly proclaim.

NAVY REPRESSION

BEFORE THE MILITARY COUP

Despite the candor of Admiral Vergara's statements and his claim that "in an institution like the Chilean Navy, the violation of human rights has never been part of its doctrine. On the contrary, our values-based, ethical training demands the protection of human rights," history proves otherwise.

The Navy used torture even before the military coup, particularly in the repression of a group of democratic sailors who, in July of '73, revealed the coup preparations. Ricardo Tobar, then a Navy corporal, was detained by an Air Force patrol in Quintero, but it was not until the arrival of a contingent of Naval Intelligence that the situation changed radically.

Tobar states: "They put us in a room where they beat us hard until the 18th. They were intelligence groups, sailors who were in the departments; I didn't know any of them. There, they hooded us, the positions on our knees and with our heads bowed, fetal position, the blows, the kicks—you didn't know where they were going to come from, where they were going to hit you.

They start interrogating you about many things; I don't remember if they did the same to other comrades, it was never the same for any of the three of us. At certain moments, the people who were with us let us glimpse something—'damn, if it's going to be my turn, at least let me warn my family'—it was a matter of great fear; the tortures were directed at getting you to denounce more people.

Fortunately, they kept asking me about the relationship I had with some of the detainees, so I had to answer, and I always answered with the truth. Why? Because, for example, they asked me about Claudio Espinoza; how could I not know him if we played together on the soccer team, we went to school together, how could I not know him; Sebastián Ibarra, we entered school together, how could I not know him.

At a certain moment, they took me to the soccer field, where there is a kind of target practice area, where they did pistol target practice. They put us there as if to execute us and did a fake demonstration; that was the moment I felt fear.

I felt fear there, I cannot deny it. It was the only moment I felt fear that ran through me from head to toe, but after having passed that stage of fear, I realized that it was a lie that they were going to execute us, because they had me captured, they didn't have me alone, so they weren't going to shoot.

Fortunately, they didn't kill me; they fired and everything, but the shots weren't at me, but into the air." Naval Intelligence practiced on its own personnel what would later become a systematic policy of extermination and repression against militants or sympathizers of the Unidad Popular, the MIR, and, later, against opponents of the dictatorship in the area.

It is within this framework that the detention, torture, and disappearance of Jaime Aldoney Vargas, a socialist militant and overseer of the Compañía Cervecerías Unidas in Limache, materialized. Aldoney was detained by the Carabineros on September 11 itself, tortured at the city's police station, and transferred two days later to the El Belloto Naval Air Base.

This facility was used as a detention and torture center and, in Aldoney's case, for murder and disappearance. The investigation by magistrate Gabriela Corti and the Fifth Department of Investigations has been able to establish that Aldoney was at the base and never left alive, contrary to the Navy's version, which maintains that Aldoney had escaped.

Furthermore, the investigation has been able to determine those responsible for the murder of Jaime Aldoney: Rear Admiral Ernesto Huber Von Appen, commander of Naval Aviation at the time; the Limache and Olmué military governor, Navy Captain Sergio Mendoza Rojas; Navy Captain Patricio Villalobos Lobos, in charge of intelligence at the base; Navy Captain Jaime Undargarín Romero; Frigate Captain Pedro Arancibia Soler, one of the most cruel torturers at the facility; and Petty Officer Manuel Buch López.

For a week now, they have been prosecuted by the special judge Gabriela Corti of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, who ordered the arrest of these six former sailors.

NAVAL WAR ACADEMY

TORTURE AND DEATH

The Navy used its facilities as places of detention and torture: the ships Lebu and Maipo, the Naval School, the Silva Palma barracks, the Submarine School, and, of course, the training ship Esmeralda, where men and women were tortured and raped, and where the priest Miguel Woodward was also murdered.

Nevertheless, three decades after those events, the Commander-in-Chief, Miguel Angel Vergara, states that "I do not have any concrete evidence that human rights were violated against people aboard the training ship Esmeralda." He surely says the same regarding the Naval War Academy, a place that recalls the infamous Navy Mechanics School (ESMA) in Buenos Aires, where few detainees survived.

The Naval War Academy, located on Pedro León Gallo street on the Playa Ancha hill, overlooks the sea and is located above the now-renovated Silva Palma barracks. They are internally connected, which is why many of the prisoners were indiscriminately tortured in one place or the other, day and night.

Paddy Ahumada was one of them. A socialist leader, he was detained at the end of September 1973 and taken to the Silva Palma barracks: "That's where the systematic torture sessions began. In my case, they stripped me, they kept us in a room from where they would call us one by one; there, we all looked at each other, worried, scared, our heartbeats at 150 per minute.

They call me, they cover my head with a hood, they force me to take off my clothes, then they tie my hands behind my back, and the dance of kicks, insults, and what-have-you begins. A very special situation occurred for me.

My reaction was to start screaming at them, 'faggots, cowards!' 'Shut up, you son of a bitch,' they would tell me, and I kept screaming, 'faggots, cowards!' They beat me so much they left me unconscious.

They didn't ask me anything; they just beat me; they cracked several of my ribs. That was when they took me on a stretcher to the Naval Hospital, where they left me in the hallway. I was unconscious; a nurse who was a relative of one of our leaders, named Armando Barrientos, saw me and gave notice.

I must have been really bad, because the news went international; even the name Paddy Ahumada appeared on Radio Moscow; the Cubans also made statements that they had killed me in Valparaíso." Admiral Vergara says he never heard of these beatings and screams, sufferings and bravery of the prisoners, but all of Valparaíso knew that in that concrete block, there on the fourth floor, the cowardice of the Navy officers and the bravery of the detainees, who defended themselves with nothing but their dignity, coexisted.

Patricia Saéz, a militant of the Communist Youth at the time of the coup, was detained at the beginning of 1974. She also vividly remembers what she saw at the Naval War Academy, recounting that "the memories that haunted me for many years were seeing people being tortured.

They would take you to an interrogation room, hooded; sometimes they would bring another detainee and torture him in front of you. It is horrifying. They only made me watch; they didn't ask me anything; they made me look at a boy—I thought they were going to break him—he was so thin, he was a university student, I didn't know him; they told us we worked together; they accused me of Plan Z.

They even laughed when they talked about Plan Z. They said the charge didn't matter, whatever they came up with they were going to do, and no one was going to tell them otherwise. They beat this boy so much, they dragged him.

I remember he was wearing a scarf, and they wrapped it around his neck and started dragging him. He was choking. Because he was choking, he grabbed the scarf with both hands to keep from choking, and when he grabbed the scarf, they kicked him in the testicles.

I didn't know what to do; they dragged him in a circle around me. Poor thing, with one hand he covered his testicles and with the other he tried not to choke. It was something that never ended. I tried several times to throw myself on top of him, and he said no, not to do anything; so I felt bad, I felt like a coward.

Amidst all his pain and desperation, he told me not to do anything." For his part, Juan Méndez, a leader of the Communist Youth, detained in December 1973 at the Silva Palma barracks, remembers that he did not happen to witness torture, "but I did see the results; I remember having seen an old man; they had beaten him on the soles of his feet with bamboo rods; his feet were not feet, they were completely deformed, enormous." He adds that "when we were upstairs, on the field, the interrogations could be heard very loudly." Of course, Juan Méndez was not only subjected to the psychological torture of hearing how other prisoners were humiliated, but he experienced the brutality firsthand. "They placed a magnet that has bare wires on your toes, finger and testicles, finger and glans, finger and finger of the hand, both hands, both ears—but I get the impression they had some kind of adapter, because on the ear it was like a clamp. In one of those interrogations, I got very heated, I got angry and tried to take off the blindfold; I think if I had taken it off, I wouldn't be here today. One of them grabbed me, immobilized me, and handcuffed me, but I was already out of control, I couldn't take it anymore. They applied a lot of current to me, in addition to the 'potro' (rack)." Méndez remembers this last form of torture as one of the heaviest, explaining that "it was a pole that was placed between two chairs or on a bench. The idea was for you to lie on your stomach and be left hanging by your feet and hands. They would leave and leave a guard watching you. When they told me to do that, I said, 'this is a piece of cake.' After 5 minutes, I didn't want any more; the pain was unbearable." Another prisoner recalls that "at the Naval War Academy, all the detainees were tortured, physically or psychologically. In fact, it was an agonizing situation of screams, of permanent wailing, of men and women at the limit of their resistance. In the Silva Palma barracks, adjacent to the Academy, there was a room where there were no more than a dozen of us prisoners. Opposite, there was another similar one that housed women. There, every night, blows and desperate, hysterical screams were heard. It was a comrade, a 15-year-old girl, who tried to commit suicide by hitting her head against the wall because they had raped her repeatedly and she no longer wanted to keep living." No one knows what happened to that teenager whose only "crime" was being poor and supporting the Unidad Popular government. But she was not the only girl who fell into the hands of the cowardly Navy officers, because the dictatorship made no distinction of gender, age, or political militancy. It simply detained, tortured, and murdered when it deemed it convenient. For this reason, Marco Antonio Contardo was detained when he was only 15 years old, in October 1973. 30 years have passed, but it still hurts Contardo to remember those moments, when he was detained along with his mother, Nidia Guerra, and his grandmother, Olga Hogtert, 65, a teacher and assistant principal of Girls' School No. 18 in Playa Ancha: "We were detained by a naval patrol in charge of a Marine Corps officer and a person in civilian clothes. We were taken to the Naval War Academy. There were different rooms for the newcomers and for those who had already gone through interrogations and torture. I was tortured the next day, previously tied up, blindfolded, and stripped, listening in the room to the screams of my mother, who was begging them not to do anything to me. The interrogation was solely and exclusively with the objective of revealing the whereabouts of my father—the lawyer for the Valparaíso Intendancy at the time, Emilio Contardo—on the assumption that I should know it. The interrogation began, apparently formal, to increase in violence, with multiple blows all over the body and applications of electricity. During my detention, I was able to verify the presence of children, the elderly, women, and men. The entire human spectrum, who systematically and massively went through the torture process." When he had the chance not to be blindfolded, Marco Antonio Contardo was able to recognize people who remained detained at the Academy: Silvia Lillo, Reinaldo Narváez, Heraclio Mendoza, Sergio Fischer, a prominent cardiologist, and the photographer Jorge Cárdenas, it being "the first time in my life that I saw a body completely black from the beatings." Marco Antonio Contardo remained detained for two weeks on the ship Lebu, was released, and then detained again by the Navy in November of the same year. He is emphatic in indicating that "I was detained by Navy officers and I always remained in Navy facilities, being tortured only for being the son of Emilio Contardo." He also points out that Admiral Miguel Angel Vergara's statements are laughable when he speaks of the Navy's doctrine including the respect and protection of human rights, when "I personally saw how Navy officers played with an epileptic patient, whom they put on a ping-pong table and bet on which side of the table he would fall off when he had a seizure." Is it possible to forget this? Is it possible to speak of reconciliation and forgetting when such horror was lived?

NEITHER FORGIVENESS NOR FORGETTING: ONLY JUSTICE

For Admiral Vergara and the Navy, it is easy to do so: they do not feel responsible for anything that happened in naval facilities nor for any of the crimes committed by officers of the institution. Moreover, the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy states that "forgiveness is a process of deep individual reflection, of each person; in that sense, I would feel, truthfully, that I was betraying my institution by asking for forgiveness for something for which it is not responsible." The Navy continues to deny its participation in the massive violation of human rights despite all the information available that testifies to the contrary. Despite the information contained in the Rettig Report, in the report of the Ethics Commission Against Torture of the 5th Region, and the testimonies of men and women who were tortured in naval facilities or in the concentration camps established by the Navy. The government also does not contribute to the clarification of the facts by maintaining, like the military institutions, the idea that here there were only "excesses" by some individuals and that the repression did not constitute an institutional policy. Such a situation makes Paddy Ahumada feel "a mixture of indignation and helplessness so great that, really, for the sake of mental health, one tries to think about something else. But that situation makes me furious, that there isn't a stronger attitude; it seems like an audacity, a cynicism, and an unacceptable brazenness. I, at least, as long as I have a molecule of energy, will oppose in whatever spaces I can that that type of policy of forgetting and forgiveness functions, because the only way to save yourself if you have a tumor in your body is to excise it, and that necessarily involves truth and justice, and I add: punishment for the murderers. It cannot be that some bastards who tortured, killed, raped, and murdered walk down the street very calmly; that generates a trauma in society." And of course, because the arguments adduced by the Navy are puerile and unacceptable. Admiral Vergara maintains that "98% of the cases being investigated occurred before '78," that is, "25 years ago in a country that was, let's say, at the very least convulsed or in the process of normalization, with institutions that were not functioning at full capacity. So it is not easy—he states—it is not a matter of will; it is not easy to reconstruct things that happened 25 years ago." Marco Antonio Contardo rejects those assertions, expressing that "for me, it is very easy to reconstruct what happened twenty-five years ago, and for the torturers, it should also be; the rest are excuses." It is that clear, and since the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy maintains that his institution is always open to discussing any proposal to solve the issue of human rights, here is a proposal that is also clear and concrete: hand over all the information regarding the repression in Valparaíso, hand over the names of the officers and troops who tortured, raped, and murdered; let them be placed at the disposal of justice and, finally, ask for institutional forgiveness for the atrocities committed against each and every one of the victims of the National Navy. by MAURICIO BUENDIA

Source: puntofinal.cl, June 3, 2003

Court convicts retired Navy Rear Admiral for human rights case

The Third Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals revoked the first-instance resolution and sentenced retired Rear Admiral Ernesto Huber Von Appen to a penalty of three years and one day of remitted sentence (which does not imply prison) for the disappearance of the former Limache councilman, Jaime Aldoney Vargas, detained in 1973.

Visiting Minister Julio Miranda Lillo had acquitted Huber of responsibility, who served as commander of naval aviation, reporting to the Navy General Staff and based at the El Belloto Naval Air Base, the place from which Aldoney Vargas disappeared.

According to the plaintiff lawyer Francisco Cox, beyond the fact that it is a remitted sentence, "the ruling constitutes a precedent because it is the first conviction for human rights violations that falls on a Rear Admiral of the Navy." Also convicted were the former commander of the El Belloto Base, Sergio Iván Mendoza Rojas, and the former sailor Guillermo Ignacio Vidal Hurtado to 541 days of remitted imprisonment.

Former sailors Patricio Villalobos Lobos, Pedro Pablo Arancibia Solar, Jaime Miguel Urdangarín Romero, and Germán Patricio Valdivia Kéller received the remitted penalty of 3 years and one day as authors of the same crime.

Source: latercera.cl, June 9, 2009

Valparaíso Court revokes indictment of two former Navy officers

In a split decision, the Valparaíso Court of Appeals partially accepted the appeal filed by the defense and revoked the indictment of former Navy members Ernesto Huber von Appen and Jorge Davanzo Cintolesi for their eventual responsibility in the crimes of illicit association, kidnapping, illegal detention, and torture, crimes perpetrated starting in July 1973.

The ruling maintains that, given the merit of the background information, and there being no well-founded presumptions of participation in the acts imputed to them, in accordance with the provisions of Article 274 No. 2 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the appealed resolution of May 4, 2018, written on page 3686 of these files, issued by the Extraordinary Visiting Minister Jaime Arancibia Pinto, is revoked in that part that did not agree to revoke the indictment of the accused Ernesto Huber Von Appen and Jorge Davanzo Cintolesi and, in its place, it is declared that the petition on page 3682 is accepted and the indictment dated October 21, 2015, written on pages 2702 to 2722 of these files, is revoked regarding the accused Ernesto Huber Von Appen and Jorge Davanzo Cintolesi, who, for now, are not indicted in this case. The appealed resolution already identified is confirmed in all other respects. Decision adopted with the dissenting vote of Minister Donoso Ocampo, who was of the opinion to confirm the appealed resolution in its entirety. Likewise, the chamber rejected the appeal filed by lawyer Samuel Ginsberg, indicted in the case, and confirmed the resolution issued on the 15th of last May, which did not grant the request for declination of jurisdiction. Thus, the resolution establishes on this matter that, given the merit of the background information and the grounds set forth in the appealed resolution, the appealed resolution of May 15, 2018, written on pages 3696 and 3697 of these files, issued by the Extraordinary Visiting Minister Jaime Arancibia Pinto, is confirmed.

Source: diarioconstitucional.cl, August 15, 2018

Former Intendant Aldoney remembers the day his brother disappeared

The former Intendant of Valparaíso, Gabriel Aldoney Vargas, is currently experiencing mixed emotions, having lost his brother on September 12, 1973, after he was detained in Limache and transferred to the El Belloto Naval Air Base.

This stems from the joy and satisfaction of finally being able to determine what happened to his older brother, Jaime, contrasted with the sadness for the families of other forcibly disappeared persons who may be very far from knowing the truth.

Another source of distress for the former regional head is the situation facing the families of the six former navy officers involved in this process, as it will cause serious complications within those households.

However, he noted that only with a more humane attitude on the part of the detainees could great distress and many years of searching and suffering have been avoided.

"Since Jaime was detained, his wife began to ask questions, and it was Ernesto Huber Von Appen himself who initially told her that he had been detained but had been released. Later, they told her that he had escaped, and that was impossible because I was there too, and I can say that it was impossible," stated Gabriel Aldoney, chairman of the board of the Empresa Portuaria de Valparaíso.

WE DID NOT IMAGINE IT

On September 11, 1973, the Aldoney Vargas brothers were discussing the difficult moments Chile was going through at that time. All four had ties to the Unidad Popular government and were hoping for a plebiscite that would determine the country's future.

"In the atmosphere, one could feel what might happen, but we did not imagine that the situation would end like this, that such a tragedy would occur. We never believed we would go through this situation," Gabriel Aldoney noted.

He added: "We had a very affectionate relationship and a good friendship with all my brothers, especially with him (Jaime) because our wives were good friends."

The following day, Jaime was detained, which caused a fracture within the Aldoney family. They quickly began the search, but all efforts were in vain, given that the "arrogance with which the Navy acted did not allow us to know more about him," said Gabriel Aldoney.

PROCESS

The former intendant asserts that the Navy claimed they did not know his brother. Jaime Aldoney, 30 years old at the time, was a civil engineer, an overseer for the Compañía de Cervecerías Unidas (CCU) in Limache, and a councilman for the Socialist Party for that commune. He was also a final-year journalism student at the Valparaíso branch of the Universidad de Chile.

"I arrived in Chile at the end of 1984, and in 1985 I got in touch with the Vicaría de la Solidaridad, which had quite a few documents. In 1989, we presented the first complaint in court with the lawyer Gioconda Cotroneo, which faced many difficulties because no one wanted to contribute," Gabriel Aldoney noted.

When he was intendant, he filed the first lawsuit. However, it was the one filed by one of his brothers in the year 2000 that led the visiting judge Gabriela Corti to head the investigation, which had the detention of the former naval officials as an important milestone.

The Navy, meanwhile, declined to make statements regarding the prosecuted former officials, who are Rear Admiral Ernesto Huber Von Appen; Navy Captains Sergio Mendoza Rojas, Patricio Villalobos Lobos, and Jaime Urdangarín Romero; Frigate Captain Pedro Arancibia Soler; and Petty Officer Manuel Busch López.

Source: estrellavalpo.cl, June 14, 2003

Judge Arancibia prosecutes 18 former uniformed personnel for the "Constitutionalist Sailors" case

The minister for extraordinary causes regarding human rights violations at the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Jaime Arancibia Pinto, issued an indictment this Wednesday against 16 former members of the Navy and two retired officials of the Air Force for their responsibility in the crimes of illicit association, kidnapping, illegal detention, and torture perpetrated against nine members of the Navy starting in July 1973.

In the process, known as "Constitutionalist Sailors" or "Anti-coup Sailors," the judge is investigating the illegal detentions and application of torture against Claudio Espinoza Tordecilla, Bernardo Flores Valdebenito, Luis Jorquera Silva, Víctor López Zambrano, Julio Gajardo Neira, Ricardo Tobar Toledo, Mariano Ramírez Ramírez, Pedro Blaset Castro, and Pedro Lagos Carrasco, who were detained between July and August 1973 by Navy personnel and subjected to torture aboard the ships "Blanco Encalada" and "Latorre," as well as in military units in the Valparaíso Region.

The nine sailors were prosecuted by the Naval Court of Valparaíso for the crime of failure to perform military duties, a case that, after September 11, 1973, began to be investigated as sedition or mutiny, with the detainees remaining in custody for several months and subjected to mistreatment.

In the resolution, Judge Arancibia Pinto indicted retired Navy members Hernán Julio Macuada, Pedro Benavides Monzoni, Sergio Mendoza Rojas, Jaime Urdangarín Romero, Luis Kohler Herrera, Santiago Lorca González, Juan Tapia Villalón, Julio Alarcón Saavedra, Ernesto Huber von Appen, Víctor Villegas Herrera, Samuel Ginsberg Rojas, Fernando Landeta Ahues, Juan Mackay Barriga, Jorge Davanzo Cintolesi, Ary Acuña Figueroa, and Fernando Rojas Jiménez, as well as retired Air Force members Jorge Almarza Pizarro and Jorge Rojas Carvajal, ordering their entry into preventive detention in military units.

On April 2, 2012, the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, reopened the process because the investigation was not exhausted, ordering the execution of various proceedings by a judge not disqualified, after the visiting judge Eliana Quezada had decreed the definitive dismissal of the case.

Víctor López, one of the "Constitutionalist Sailors," spoke with RVLNoticias. This is his testimony.

Source: rvl.uv.cl, October 3, 2015

Judge Jaime Arancibia indicts seven retired Navy members

The minister for human rights violation cases at the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Jaime Arancibia, indicted and issued an arrest warrant for seven retired members of the Navy for the crime of kidnapping with serious injury of the Dominican Republic citizen, Juan Blanco Castillo.

In the resolution, the magistrate indicted Ernesto Huber von Appen, Jaime Undangarín Romero, Germán Valdivia Keller, Arístides León Calffas, Guillermo Aldoney Hansen, José Gutiérrez Bello, and Víctor Sepúlveda Cuevas as authors of the crime of kidnapping with serious injury.

According to the records, the events occurred in September 1973, when the victim, then a 25-year-old economics student, "was detained by a patrol of Navy personnel from the El Belloto Naval Air Base, led by 2nd Lieutenant Jorge Ginouves Contreras, in the Barrio Norte sector of Villa Alemana, near the train station, and was taken to the naval facility to be handed over to personnel of the Intelligence Service of the Naval Aviation Command (Comavnav)." The resolution adds that "he was subjected to various interrogations at the Air Control Information Office (OICA)."

"After remaining detained at the El Belloto Naval Air Base, Juan Blanco Castillo was taken to the Investigative Police barracks in Quilpué to remain held in the dungeons of that facility, which are located in the basement, where he was subjected to interrogations and illegal coercion by his captors, with numerous testimonies existing regarding his physical deterioration through other people detained in both facilities."

"After some time, the victim was taken out with evident signs of physical and psychological mistreatment from the aforementioned facility, in an unknown direction. After a period of six months, the Investigative Police of the Quilpué commune had to go to a sector called 'Curva M' in the town of Colliguay, where the discovery of an unidentified male corpse occurred.

According to the characteristics of the deceased's clothing and the examination of the body, police personnel presumed it to be the Dominican Juan Blanco Castillo, whose autopsy was not located, and the remains were sent to a common grave in the Quilpué Cemetery, thus configuring the crime of kidnapping with serious injury to the person of Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, a figure provided for and sanctioned in Article 141 of the Penal Code in force at the time of the events."

The accused, once notified of the indictment, must be taken to the facilities designated by the Navy to serve preventive detention.

Source: elclarin.cl, November 4, 2016

Judge orders imprisonment for Pinochet supporters who murdered a Dominican in 1973

The minister for human rights violation cases at the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Jaime Arancibia, indicted and issued an arrest warrant for seven retired members of the Navy for the crime of kidnapping with serious injury of the Dominican Republic citizen, Juan Blanco Castillo.

In the resolution, the magistrate indicted Ernesto Huber von Appen, Jaime Undangarín Romero, Germán Valdivia Keller, Arístides León Calffas, Guillermo Aldoney Hansen, José Gutiérrez Bello, and Víctor Sepúlveda Cuevas as authors of the crime of kidnapping with serious injury.

According to the records, the events occurred in September 1973, when the victim, then a 25-year-old economics student, "was detained by a patrol of Navy personnel from the El Belloto Naval Air Base, led by 2nd Lieutenant Jorge Ginouves Contreras, in the Barrio Norte sector of Villa Alemana, near the train station, and was taken to the naval facility to be handed over to personnel of the Intelligence Service of the Naval Aviation Command (Comavnav)." The resolution adds that "he was subjected to various interrogations at the Air Control Information Office (OICA)."

"After remaining detained at the El Belloto Naval Air Base, Juan Blanco Castillo was taken to the Investigative Police barracks in Quilpué to remain held in the dungeons of that facility, which are located in the basement, where he was subjected to interrogations and illegal coercion by his captors, with numerous testimonies existing regarding his physical deterioration through other people detained in both facilities."

"After some time, the victim was taken out with evident signs of physical and psychological mistreatment from the aforementioned facility, in an unknown direction. After a period of six months, the Investigative Police of the Quilpué commune had to go to a sector called 'Curva M' in the town of Colliguay, where the discovery of an unidentified male corpse occurred.

According to the characteristics of the deceased's clothing and the examination of the body, police personnel presumed it to be the Dominican Juan Blanco Castillo, whose autopsy was not located, and the remains were sent to a common grave in the Quilpué Cemetery, thus configuring the crime of kidnapping with serious injury to the person of Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, a figure provided for and sanctioned in Article 141 of the Penal Code in force at the time of the events."

The accused, once notified of the indictment, must be taken to the facilities designated by the Navy to serve preventive detention.

Source: elclarin.cl, November 10, 2016

Anti-coup sailors: Justice draws near

16 members of the Navy and two from the FACH (Air Force) are prosecuted. They were accused of the crimes of illicit association, kidnapping, illegal detention, and torture, perpetrated against members of the Navy starting in July 1973. By Carlos Antonio Vergara

A group of sailors denounced, shortly before the coup d'état of September 11, the seditious meetings and the plan being prepared to overthrow former President Salvador Allende.

All of this was based on the absolute illegality that it implied on the part of the Navy to transgress with its acts the Political Constitution of the Republic of 1925, which was in force at the time.

The sailors made these denunciations to, among others, parliamentarians of the time, including the former General Secretary of the Socialist Party, Senator Carlos Altamirano, the leader of the MAPU, Deputy Oscar Guillermo Garretón, and the General Secretary of the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR), Miguel Enríquez.

The revelation that the coup project had been denounced became known to the Navy's intelligence service, which meant, even before the coup d'état took place, detentions and torture for them.

For many years, the sailors tried to have justice served, despite all the powers that were set in motion to prevent it.

More than two years ago, on April 2, 2012, the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, reopened the process because the investigation was not exhausted, ordering the execution of various proceedings, after the visiting judge Eliana Quezada had decreed the definitive dismissal of the case.

With that resolution, the minister for extraordinary causes regarding human rights violations at the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Jaime Arancibia Pinto, prosecuted 16 former members of the Navy and two retired officials of the Air Force for their responsibility in the crimes of illicit association, kidnapping, illegal detention, and torture, crimes perpetrated against 9 members of the Navy starting in July 1973.

Detained on ships and units of the V Region

In the process, known as Constitutionalist Sailors, the magistrate is investigating the illegal detentions and application of torture against Claudio Espinoza Tordecilla, Bernardo Flores Valdebenito, Luis Jorquera Silva, Víctor López Zambrano, Julio Gajardo Neira, Ricardo Tobar Toledo, Mariano Ramírez Ramírez, Pedro Blaset Castro, and Pedro Lagos Carrasco, detained between July and August 1973 by Navy personnel and subjected to torture aboard the ships Blanco Encalada and Latorre, and also in military units of the Valparaíso Region.

The victims were prosecuted by the Naval Court of Valparaíso for the crime of failure to perform military duties, a case that, after September 11, 1973, began to be investigated as sedition or mutiny, with the detainees remaining in custody for several months and subjected to mistreatment.

In the resolution, Judge Arancibia Pinto indicted the retired Navy members: Hernán Julio Macuada, Pedro Benavides Monzoni, Sergio Mendoza Rojas, Jaime Urdangarín Romero, Luis Kohler Herrera, Santiago Lorca González, Juan Tapia Villalón, Julio Alarcón Saavedra, Ernesto Huber von Appen, Víctor Villegas Herrera, Samuel Ginsberg Rojas, Fernando Landeta Ahues, Juan Mackay Barriga, Jorge Davanzo Cintolesi, Ary Acuña Figueroa, and Fernando Rojas Jiménez.

In addition, he prosecuted the retired Air Force members Jorge Almarza Pizarro and Jorge Rojas Carvajal, ordering their entry into preventive detention in military units.

Magistrate Arancibia Pinto established that on August 7, 1973, Claudio Espinoza Pinto, "a first-class sailor on the ship Blanco Encalada, anchored in Valparaíso, was called by Commander Julio Macuada, who accused him of having held seditious conversations with civilians and sailors, which was denied by him.

He was then taken by a first corporal, Morales, to the Silva Palma barracks, where he was again interrogated under different tortures, consisting of being hung by his feet and beaten with sandbags and rods, and also being subjected to electric shocks to his genitals."

Interrogations, threats under a hood

Afterward, he was forced to sign a statement and accused by the naval justice system of the crime of failure to perform military duties.

The magistrate determined that with the investigative statements of the accused, "well-founded presumptions appear that allow establishing the following crimes: kidnapping, illegal detention, torture or other cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, and illicit association."

In the ruling, the judge details that Luis Reginaldo Jorquera Silva was on medical leave in July 1973 and "an officer from the base came to look for him at his home, for which he had to appear before Commander Sergio Mendoza Rojas, who asked him about his intervention in a seditious proposal to replace said commander, after which he was detained and taken to the Silva Palma barracks."

"In the first days of October 1973, the victim was detained in Limache by marines and taken to the Olmué sanatorium, where he was subjected to kicks and punches while hooded. He was then transferred to the Investigative Police and Carabineros and finally to the War Academy, where he was again beaten and interrogated, and also threatened, being able to realize that among those questioning him was Navy Lieutenant Jaime Urdagarin Romero," the resolution details.

Víctor López Zambrano, a first-class sailor and electronic mechanic on the cruiser Prat in Talcahuano, was detained on August 7, 1973, by naval personnel and taken to the Borgoño fort in that city.

There, López was "beaten by a group of marines and then stripped, and subsequently was subjected to different tortures consisting of being submerged headfirst in a drum full of excrement and waste" and other tortures while they kept him hooded, adds Judge Arancibia in the indictment.

Served prison sentences

A similar situation was experienced on June 15, 1973, by Julio Gajardo Neira, a second corporal and electronic mechanic at the El Belloto Naval Air Base of the Chilean Navy, who was called by Commander Sergio Mendoza Rojas, who, in the presence of other officers, including Ernesto Von Appen, accused him of seditious and political attitudes.

Subsequently, he was sent to the Silva Palma barracks, held incommunicado.

After the coup d'état, Gajardo was taken out of the Valparaíso prison and taken to the Naval War Academy to be tortured with electricity, causing him burns, and he then had to serve a sentence.

Ricardo Tobar Toledo, a first-class sailor in the Navy, was detained in Quintero by personnel of the Chilean Air Force (Fach), led by Flight Captain Jorge Almarza Pizarro and Second Lieutenant Alejandro Rojas Carvajal, taken to the Fach base, and then to the Las Salinas armament school, where he was tortured.

Tobar recognized by their voices the commander of the School, Jorge Davanzo, Captain Cárdenas, and Lieutenant Rodríguez. They then took him to the Silva Palma barracks to torture him psychologically. They held a War Council and sentenced him.

Mariano Lautaro Ramírez Ramírez, a second corporal and electrician in the Navy, was detained at the Naval Engineering School of Las Salinas in Viña del Mar on August 11, 1973, and taken to the Silva Palma barracks.

The other sailors suffered similar situations.

The constitutionalist sailors were victims of crimes against humanity, such as the crime of torture practiced by State agents, in accordance with international treaties signed and ratified by Chile, which, according to jurisprudence, are understood to be incorporated into the domestic legal system and have constitutional rank.

However, the trial is just beginning, as the accused still have to argue their defenses, a possibility the victims did not have, who also paid with prison time. Subsequently, a sentence must be issued, which will surely be appealed, and finally, as happens in a large part of the processes, the Supreme Court will have to rule.

Source: villagrimaldi.cl, April 9, 2018

7 retired military personnel sentenced in Chile for the kidnapping of the Dominican Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo

Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo was the son of the prominent lawyer and politician Ramón Andrés Blanco Fernández. The dictator Augusto Pinochet, supported by the US government to overthrow President Salvador Allende.

Seven retired military personnel from Chile were sentenced for the kidnapping and the damages caused in 1973 to the Dominican Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, son of the politician and lawyer Ramón Andrés Blanco Fernández.

The military personnel of the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship were sentenced by the minister for extraordinary causes regarding human rights violations at the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Max Cancino Cancino.

The news portal of the Universidad de Valparaíso, Chile, explained that the sentencing of seven retired members of the Navy was due to their responsibility in the crime of "kidnapping with serious injury or qualified kidnapping of the Dominican citizen Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo."

The crime was committed in September 1973, in the city of Villa Alemana, after the coup d'état against President Salvador Allende, committed on September 11 of that year, which gave way to the imposition of a bloody right-wing dictatorship.

"In the ruling (case roll 53.046-2009), Minister Cancino Cancino sentenced Ernesto Leonardo Huber von Appen, Wilfredo Hernán Zepeda Iturriaga, Víctor Orlando Rey Ringele, Jaime Miguel Urdangarín Romero, Arístides Alejandro León Calffas, and German Patricio Valdivia Keller to 15 years in prison, with the legal accessories of absolute perpetual disqualification for public offices and positions and political rights, and absolute disqualification for professional titles for the duration of the sentences," the portal indicates.

Likewise, it explains that Jorge Benjamín Ginouvés Contreras was sentenced to 5 years in prison, with the benefit of supervised release, remaining subject to the permanent surveillance and guidance of a delegate for the same period.

This defendant was also sentenced to absolute perpetual disqualification for political rights and absolute disqualification for public offices and positions during the time of the sentence, as a co-author of the crime.

In the case, the acquittal of the accused José Abraham Gutiérrez Bello, Víctor Vicente Sepúlveda Cuevas, and Guillermo Samuel Aldoney Hansen was decreed, as their participation in the events was not proven.

In the resolution, the aforementioned portal reports, the visiting minister considered the following facts proven:

"That there existed a military intelligence group, hierarchical and disciplined, called Intelligence Service Ancla 2, belonging to the Naval Aviation Command, which operated actively starting on September 11, 1973, made up of agents belonging to the various departments of the El Belloto Naval Air Base and even officials from other departments, such as Marines, whose main objective was the repression of people opposed to the military regime, for which they proceeded to search for and detain them, who were then deprived of liberty to obtain information through physical and psychological torture.

To achieve the detention of the people, the heads of the naval patrols maintained direct communication with the Naval Intelligence Service, who, once the civilian was apprehended, took him to the Air Control Office (OICA) for confinement and interrogation."

It adds that for operational repression, "the so-called Naval Intelligence Service Ancla 2, dependent on the Naval Aviation Command, used various facilities of the El Belloto Naval Air Base, in particular the so-called Air Control Information Office (OICA or ARO) and had others available, such as the Investigative Police Barracks of Quilpué, facilities in which the prisoners were interrogated under illegal coercion."

It narrates that, on an undetermined date in the month of September 1973, after the 20th, Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, a citizen of the Dominican Republic, who had entered Chile in the month of January of that year from the USSR, 25 years of age, due to his political orientation, was ordered to be detained by the Naval Intelligence Service Ancla 2 of the Naval Aviation Command, which was carried out by a naval patrol, led by 2nd Lieutenant Jorge Ginouvés Contreras, in the Barrio Norte sector of Villa Alemana, near the train station, and he was taken to the naval facility to be handed over to the personnel of said Intelligence Service. The aforementioned Officer, in command of the naval patrol, as stated, acted in coordination with the personnel of the aforementioned Intelligence Service.

In the investigations, it was confirmed that neither the military command of the Naval Aviation Command nor that of the Naval Intelligence Service Ancla 2 belonging to that Command adopted any measure to report to the competent authority either the detention of Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo or any alleged illicit act committed by the Dominican.

Nor was any naval case or investigation formed in that regard.

"On the contrary, it was deliberately ordered to the officials of the Investigative Police of Quilpué and the Carabineros Sub-precinct of Quilpué that the entries of the detainees brought to those facilities by the Intelligence Service officials were not to be registered.

The same happened at the Naval Air Base, where the names of the detainees were not noted in any official register," the information maintains.

It narrates that the victim was initially held in a sector of the El Belloto Naval Air Base called 'Acapulco', 'El Hoyo', or 'El Pozo' together with other prisoners, a detention site that was enabled by the Commander of Naval Aviation after September 11, 1973, for the confinement of civilians opposed to the military regime.

In that place, the prisoners had to remain permanently in a prone position, with their hands behind their backs, outdoors, and guarded by at least two armed officials from the Naval Air Base. This sector was strictly restricted, with only officials from the Naval Intelligence Service of Unit Ancla 2 belonging to the Naval Aviation Command authorized to approach.

The confinement sector was strategically located in front of the Command Office and the Air Control Office (OICA or ARO)."

It highlights that during the period he remained locked up, the Dominican Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo, without any justifying motive, was taken on several occasions to the Air Control Information Office, a place where he was interrogated and physically coerced by officials of the Naval Intelligence Service Ancla 2 and with the presence of the military command and other officials who collaborated closely with that Service, all with the object of having him answer about his activities and the location of alleged hidden weaponry in Santiago.

Likewise, after Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo remained locked up at the El Belloto Naval Air Base, officials of the Naval Intelligence Service Ancla 2, on an unspecified date in the month of October 1973, transferred the victim and kept him deprived of liberty in the dungeons of the Investigative Police Barracks of Quilpué.

It explains that in a dependency of this facility, the officials of the intelligence group interrogated and severely tortured him, using among other techniques the application of burning newspaper to burn him on the abdomen.

"On an unspecified day in the month of October 1973, Juan Andrés Blanco Castillo was removed from the Investigative Police Barracks of Quilpué by the aforementioned intelligence group, being transferred to the Carabineros Sub-precinct of Quilpué, with the victim being seriously injured as a result of the burns caused on his body.

Due to the complaint that the Chief of that Sub-precinct expressed to the command of the Naval Command regarding the state of health of the victim, he was removed from that place by officials of the intelligence group, in an unknown direction, and there has been no news of his whereabouts to date."

In the civil aspect, the ruling accepted the lawsuit filed and ordered the treasury to pay compensation of $150,000,000 (one hundred and fifty million pesos) for moral damages to the victim's father (Ramón Andrés Blanco Fernández); and $75,000,000 (seventy-five million pesos) to a brother.

Source: acento.com.do, February 3, 2023