Date of Birth: 02-02-46, 28 years old at the time of detention. Address: Población Nueva Palena, Peñalolén, Santiago. Marital Status: Married, two children. Occupation: Industrial Safety Instructor, former worker at the El Salvador Mine. Political Affiliation: Member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party. Date of Detention: July 27, 1974

Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, married, father of two, former employee of the El Salvador Mine and a Socialist militant, was detained on July 27, 1974, around 10:30 a.m., at the home of his friend Guillermo Naveas, located at 5352 Arturo Medina Street, in the commune of Ñuñoa. The arrest was carried out by DINA agents who claimed to belong to the Military Intelligence Service.

Days later, on July 31, he was taken by his captors to his home in the Población Nueva Palena, where they did not allow him to get out of the vehicle in which he was being transported. They called his children—aged 4 and 5—to greet him, and then they left.

The victim was sitting between two people, handcuffed, and appeared to have a beard. Four days later, the same civilians returned to the house to pick up a change of clothes.

His family had no news of his whereabouts until August 9 of that year, when the press reported the discovery of an arsenal on the slopes of the "Indio Muerto" hill, 10 km inside El Salvador, "discovered by personnel of the Military Intelligence Service." It was also claimed that this material was in the possession of Joel Huaiquiñir, nicknamed "El Huaico," a Socialist militant who had been detained on July 31 in Santiago while allegedly driving a truck owned by the El Salvador Mine.

Finally, it was stated that the detainee—who had been charged by the police with concealment of weapons and theft of explosive material from the mine—had confessed to the existence of these weapons, which were supposedly intended to "blow up barracks, police stations, and military installations..." Personal information about the victim was also provided, such as his Socialist militancy, party responsibilities, previous union activity, and an alleged trip to Moscow where—he had supposedly confessed—he was sent to receive instructions.

Other Socialist militants were allegedly involved in this discovery, but their names were not mentioned "so as not to hinder the ongoing investigations," the report concluded.

As was later established, after being detained at his friend's house, Joel Huaiquiñir was taken to the secret DINA facility located at Londres 38, where he was seen by several prisoners who were later released, including Erika Hennings, Cristián Van Yurick, and Mario Aguilera Salazar.

These witnesses, along with Huaiquiñir, were transferred on August 19 of that year to the Cuatro Alamos Camp, also under DINA custody. In this place, he shared a bunk bed with Cristián Van Yurick.

Both Aguilera and Van Yurick agree that the victim was taken out of Cuatro Alamos and brought to the north of the country following the discovery of the weapons. According to Aguilera, Huaiquiñir feared this would happen because he had worked in El Salvador.

After this "trip," and around those same days, he was taken out of Cuatro Alamos, but not before being ordered to take all his belongings. Aguilera asked a guard what was happening with Huaiquiñir, and the guard replied that they had taken him to the South.

According to the testimony of Luz Arce, a former Socialist militant who began collaborating with the DINA after her own detention, she claims to have seen Huaiquiñir on one occasion—in July 1974—at Villa Grimaldi.

The DINA agents operating at that time in the facilities where the victim was held included Major Marcelo Moren Brito, Lieutenants Miguel Krassnoff and Fernando Laureani (all three from the Army), Carabineros Lieutenant Ricardo Lawrence, Osvaldo Romo Mena, Carabineros Sub-officer Basclay Zapata (known as "El Troglo"), and Army Colonel Pedro Espinoza Bravo, among others.

Other coworkers of the victim from El Salvador were detained in September 1973 and taken to the Copiapó Regiment, where they were executed by order of General Sergio Arellano Stark, joining other victims of this delegation in various cities in the north of the country.

They were Ricardo García Posada, Benito Tapia, and Maguindo Castillo. For this reason, Joel Huaiquiñir moved with his family to Santiago at that time.

Although the authorities acknowledged the detention of Joel Huaiquiñir, they reported that he had been released on September 14, 1974.

However, the victim has been forcibly disappeared since he was taken from Cuatro Alamos in late August or early September 1974, "heading South," as a guard told another prisoner. It is known from the statements of a former DINA agent that the organization used the term "Puerto Montt" to indicate that a prisoner was going to be killed "by land," and the term "La Moneda" when they had the same fate "by sea," where they were thrown from an aircraft.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

On August 2, 1974, his spouse filed a writ of amparo (habeas corpus) before the Santiago Court of Appeals, case file 844-74. The 5th Chamber ordered an inquiry to the Prefect of Investigations of Santiago regarding the victim, who replied that Huaiquiñir was not being held in those facilities.

Upon learning of this response on August 12, the Ministers only then decided to officially notify the Ministries of the Interior and Defense, ten days after the amparo was filed and 17 days after the victim was detained. These requests were reiterated on September 3, as they had still not been answered.

On September 5, 1974, the Minister of the Interior reported that Huaiquiñir was being held by order of that Minister, by virtue of an Exempt Decree. He did not provide the date or the place where he was being held.

Based on this report, and without waiting for a response from the Ministry of Defense—which never responded—the filed appeal was rejected on September 9, 1974.

This resolution was appealed, and the 2nd Chamber of the Supreme Court ordered that the Minister of the Interior be notified to expand on the information provided and to account for the date and place of the victim's detention.

This request was reiterated twice, and only on October 22 of that year did the Minister—General César Benavides—reply that Joel Huaiquiñir had been released by virtue of another Exempt Decree from that Ministry.

Again, he provided no date—neither for the release nor for the Decree—while ignoring the Supreme Court's inquiry regarding the date and place of detention. Nevertheless, on October 23, 1974, the 2nd Chamber, taking into account General Benavides' response, confirmed the appealed resolution.

The Supreme Court also did not grant a request from the spouse to order an investigation into his disappearance by the corresponding court, since the family had already been informed by the authorities of his alleged release.

On December 23, 1974, a complaint for alleged foul play (presunta desgracia) was filed before the 8th Criminal Court, which initiated case file 11.602-2.

On February 18, 1975, the Investigations police, reporting on an investigation order, indicated to the Court that, upon consulting SENDET, the victim was not registered in their books.

However, on March 15, 1975, the Executive Secretary of SENDET, Colonel Jorge Espinoza, informed the Court that the victim had been detained by virtue of Exempt Decree No. 285 of the Ministry of the Interior, dated August 9, 1974, and that the same authority had ordered his release through another Exempt Decree—No. 414—on September 16 of the same year.

In the meantime, the Judge reviewed the file of the Writ of Amparo in favor of the victim.

With this information and an official letter from the Civil Registry stating that no death certificate for Huaiquiñir existed, the summary was closed on June 9, 1975, and a temporary dismissal was issued, as the crime had not been proven. This resolution was approved by the Santiago Court of Appeals on July 14 of that year.

In February 1978, members of a Norwegian solidarity organization with Chile filed a writ of amparo from that country in favor of forcibly disappeared victims, including Joel Huaiquiñir. There is no record of its processing, Case File 61-78 of the Santiago Court of Appeals.

On August 14, 1991, his spouse filed a criminal complaint for aggravated kidnapping and illegal coercion against the DINA agents who operated in the Londres 38 and Cuatro Alamos facilities. In this filing, new information was provided, such as the testimonies of witnesses to Joel Huaiquiñir's detention and imprisonment.

This case was entered into the 8th Criminal Court under case file 11.603. As of December 1992, the closure of the summary was recorded.

While the judge was decreeing the closure of the summary, in November 1992, one of the DINA agents against whom the complaint had been directed was arrested. Indeed, Osvaldo Romo Mena was arrested upon his arrival in national territory following his expulsion from Brazil.

Romo had resided in that country since late 1975, having left on instructions from the DINA due to judicial summons regarding cases of forcibly disappeared persons. The DINA provided him with documents with a new identity for him and his family.

His location was determined through proceedings ordered by Judge Gloria Olivares of the 3rd Criminal Court of Santiago in the case regarding the disappearance of Alfonso Chanfreau Oyarce. As of December 1992, 7 indictments had been issued against Romo Mena, and he was awaiting interrogation in relation to Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides.

Source: Vicaría de la Solidaridad

It is very different to walk down Londres Street today, in the heart of Santiago, than it was to have done so blindfolded to enter No. 38, a clandestine center of political imprisonment and torture during the dictatorship.

However, the memorial that has just been inaugurated there will allow visitors to see plaques that replicate the effect of the tiles that the detainees managed to glimpse, from under their blindfolds, upon entering "Yucatán," the name the DINA gave to that clandestine barracks.

Between the cobblestones of the narrow street, in front of the dilapidated house that was the headquarters of the Socialist Party until the coup d'état, 300 white marble and black granite plaques were installed.

They remember the 96 Chileans who were forcibly disappeared from there between September 1973 and the end of 1974. Survivors, relatives, and comrades of the fallen, public figures, artists, and authorities attended the inaugural act of this space.

The Londres 38 Collective, the promoter of the initiative, emphasized that "Never Again" is not a matter of the future, but a current task that, however, "is not guaranteed by the mere knowledge of the horror.

It is necessary to promote a rational and political judgment on what happened and on its relationship with this time, in which we continue to live with impunity. There is an unsatisfied demand for truth and justice, and as long as there is no full response to that demand, the past will continue to be part of our present."

For the relatives, "the memory associated with this site, hidden for so long and so many times, is to account for the political and generational identity of the victims, the vast majority of whom were MIR militants, young people who were an active part of the social and political struggles of the time.

Men and women who chose to resist the dictatorship, part of those who fought from the beginning to recover democracy. It is for this reason that today they cannot be absent from its construction: a society that prides itself on being democratic cannot be so if it forgets those who fought for it, because that oblivion weighs not only on the kidnapped and disappeared, on the omitted, but on the society itself that forgets a piece of its own life."

The Victims The attendees—many with their voices choked with emotion—chanted "present" when the names of the fallen were read, engraved on the plaques that also indicate their date of detention, age, and militancy.

The forcibly disappeared persons who passed through that clandestine center were Elena Díaz Agüero and Cecilia Labrín Saso (both pregnant), M. Inés Alvarado Borgel, M. Angélica Andreoli Bravo, Sonia Bustos Reyes, Muriel Dockendorff Navarrete, Ruth Escobar Salinas, María Elena González Inostroza, Elsa Leuthner Muñoz, Violeta López Díaz, Rosetta Pallini González, Marcela Sepúlveda Troncoso, and Bárbara Uribe Tamblay.

Also Miguel Angel Acuña Castillo, Carlos Adler Zulueta, Eduardo Alarcón Jara, Dignaldo Araneda Pizzini, Alberto Arias Vega, Víctor Arévalo Muñoz, Juan Bautista Barrios Barros, Alvaro Barrios Duque, Jaime Buzio Lorca, Jaime Cádiz Norambuena, Luis Alberto Canales Vivanco, Iván Carreño Aguilera, Manuel Carreño Navarro, Manuel Castro Videla, Juan Chacón Olivares, René Chanfreau Oyarce, Darío Chávez Lobos, Hugo Concha Villegas, Abundio Contreras González, Carlos Cubillos Gálvez, Carlos Cuevas Moya, Martín Elgueta Pinto, Rodolfo Espejo Gómez, Jorge Espinoza Méndez, Modesto Espinoza Pozo, Albano Fioraso Chau, Sergio Flores Ponce, Francisco Fuentealba Fuentealba, Gregorio Gaete Farías, Andrés Galdámez Muñoz, Héctor Garay Hermosilla, Víctor Garretón Romero, Máximo Gedda Ortiz (editor of Punto Final), Galo González Inostroza, Jorge Grez Aburto, Luis Guajardo Zamorano, Segundo Gutiérrez Avila, Patricio Gómez Vega, Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, Juan Ibarra Toledo, Mauricio Jorquera Encina, Eduardo Lara Petrovich, Aroldo Laurie Luengo, Ofelio Lazo Lazo, Gumercindo Machuca Morales, Zacarías Machuca Muñoz, Juan Maturana Pérez, Washington Maturana Pérez, Juan Meneses Reyes, Sergio Montecinos Alfaro, Ricardo Montecinos Slaughter, Newton Morales Saavedra, Germán Moreno Fuenzalida, Juan Mura Morales, Leopoldo Muñoz Andrade, Ramón Núñez Espinoza, Jorge Olivares Graindorge, José Orellana Meza, Luis Orellana Pérez, Alejandro Parada González, Pedro Poblete Córdova, Marcos Quiñones Lembach, José Ramírez Rosales, Agustín Reyes González, Daniel Reyes Piña, Sergio Riveros Villavicencio, Patricio Rojas Castro, Gerardo Rubilar Morales, Julio Saa Pizarro, Ernesto Salamanca Morales, Jorge Salas Paradisi, Carlos Salcedo Morales, Hernán Sarmiento Sabater, Sergio Tormen Méndez, Enrique Toro Romero, Ricardo Troncoso Muñoz, Luis Valenzuela Figueroa, Modesto Vallejos Villagrán, Ewin van Yurik Altamirano, and Sergio Vera Figueroa.

Camouflage and Silence

From that house at Londres 38, located very close to the San Francisco church, whose bells the detainees could hear, the DINA began the terrorist practice of the disappearance of detainees. The existence of the place, whose location the survivors identified thanks to the tolling of the bells, was denied by the Armed Forces for decades.

In democracy, the silence persisted, but the survivors testified in court about the horrors experienced at Londres 38, confronting former torturers and confirming statements made during the dictatorship. This was fundamental in allowing for the convictions of the DINA's top leadership.

The Army—which had leased the house to the O'Higginiano Institute—had "camouflaged" the place by giving it the number 40 to make it difficult to locate. After years of strenuous struggle by human rights collectives and survivor groups, the house was declared a national monument in 2005.

The groups linked to this battle for memory, the Londres 38 Collective, the 119 Collective, and Memoria 119, formed a working group with the government to discuss the objectives and the plan for the comprehensive recovery of the property, which is very deteriorated.

Members of the 119 Collective expressed their satisfaction with this achievement, which contributes to "cleansing the country of so much oblivion and impunity, recovering the valuable testimony, dreams, and projects of so many, among whom are our dear forcibly disappeared relatives from the list of the 119, offering it as a lesson and historical heritage for all of society."

The memorial is a project managed by the Londres 38 Collective, designed by María Fernanda Rojas, Macarena Silva, Heike Höpfner, and Pablo Moraga with the support of the human rights program of the Ministry of the Interior (more information at www.londres38.cl).

The collectives not only had to fight so that the property at Londres 38 would not be sold to private individuals, but also to reverse the government's decision to install the headquarters of the Human Rights Institute there.

The mobilization of relatives, survivors, and friends of the disappeared managed to break the oblivion cast over this torture house, the only one that was not physically destroyed, as happened with Villa Grimaldi or José Domingo Cañas.

LUCIA SEPULVEDA RUIZ

(Published in Punto Final edition No. 673, October 24, 2008)

Source: puntofinal.la November 2008

The Association of Relatives and Friends of Political Executions and forcibly disappeared persons of Atacama, on the day of forced disappearance, through spokesperson Rodolfo Villarroel, expressed their satisfaction that "through various meetings with government authorities, we have managed to obtain the government's commitment to continue the search for our comrades who are still disappeared."

There are 14 children from the Atacama region who remain in this condition, three of them with active searches: Ricardo García, Benito Tapia, and Maguindo Castillo, victims of the Caravan of Death during its passage through Copiapó, who worked at the Salvador division of Codelco Chile. "With the Undersecretariat of Justice and the Minister herself, we have managed to secure the funding to be able to continue that search," indicated Rodolfo.

At the same time, the spokesperson positively valued that at the national level this Tuesday the 30th, 17 complaints are being presented in Santiago for 25 victims of serious human rights violations who had never filed a legal action, this by the human rights program of the Ministry of Justice, and indicated that it is a clear sign of commitment "to truth and justice."

The people who are still disappeared in Atacama are Pedro Acevedo Gallardo, a student from Tierra Amarilla at the UDA; Rafael Araya Villanueva; Yactong Juantock from Copiapó, an architecture student; Aladín Rojas Ramírez, a miner from Tierra Amarilla; Guillermo Rojas Zamora, a teacher from Chañaral; Alonso Lazo Rojas, a pedagogy student disappeared in Copiapó; José Gugguiana, a teacher disappeared while fleeing; Lenin Díaz, from Vallenar, disappeared in the DINA operation; Leonardo Iribarren; JOEL HUAQUIÑIR BENAVIDES; and Félix Vargas.

ACTIVITY

This Thursday, a cultural activity will be held in the plaza of Copiapó, starting at 12:00 p.m., in commemoration of the Atacama victims of serious human rights violations, in which other friendly organizations committed to promoting a respectful approach to life and human rights will be present.

The activity will include music, dance, and a graphic exhibition on banners where each of the forcibly disappeared persons will be present, among others.

Source: radioamigavallenar.cl August 31, 2022 Date: 08-31-2022

Supreme Court convicts former DINA agents for the qualified kidnapping of a Socialist Party leader

The Supreme Court confirmed the sentence that condemned Miguel Krassnoff Martchenko and César Manríquez Bravo to 10 years of imprisonment as authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, a member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party. The illicit act was perpetrated starting on July 27, 1974, in Santiago.

The Supreme Court rejected the appeals in cassation filed by the defense against the sentence that condemned the agents of the extinct National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), Miguel Krassnoff Martchenko and César Manríquez Bravo, to 10 years of imprisonment as authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of the member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party, Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides.

The illicit act was perpetrated starting on July 27, 1974, in Santiago.

In a unanimous ruling (case file 2.352-2019), the Second Chamber of the high court—composed of ministers Haroldo Brito, Manuel Antonio Valderrama, Jorge Dahm, Leopoldo Llanos, and lawyer (i) Pía Tavolari—ruled out any error of law in the appealed resolution, issued by the Santiago Court of Appeals, which had refused to apply the "half-prescription" (a reduced sentence based on the passage of time) in this case.

"Without prejudice to what is stated in the ruling, the constant jurisprudence of this Penal Chamber has used two arguments to dismiss this ground for appeal, insofar as it is based on Article 103 of the Penal Code," the ruling states.

The resolution adds: "(...) the classification of the illicit act committed as a crime against humanity obliges the consideration of International Human Rights Law regulations, which exclude the application of both total prescription and the so-called half-prescription, as these institutions are understood to be closely linked in their foundations and, consequently, contrary to the ius cogens regulations originating from that sphere of International Penal Law, which reject impunity and the imposition of penalties not proportional to the intrinsic gravity of the crimes, based on the passage of time."

"But along with this, it is emphasized that whatever interpretation may be made of the foundation of the legal precept in question, it is certain that the norms to which Article 103 refers grant a mere faculty to the judge and do not impose the obligation to reduce the amount of the penalty even if several mitigating factors concur, so the denounced vices lack substantial influence on the operative part of the challenged ruling (among others, SCS File 35.788-2017, of March 20, 2018; 39.732-2017, of May 14, 2018; 36.731-2017, of September 25, 2018; and 2.661-2018, of December 23, 2019)," it adds.

For the Penal Chamber: "Due to the above, a violation of Article 68 of the punitive code cannot be considered to have been committed, since its denunciation was inevitably linked to admitting the alleged errors of law reproached and discarded in the preceding paragraphs, all of which necessarily leads to the conclusion that the appeal must be dismissed."

In the first instance, the extraordinary visiting judge of the Santiago Court of Appeals, Miguel Vázquez Plaza, established the following facts:

"That a group of agents belonging to the National Intelligence Directorate, DINA, who depended on the Metropolitan Intelligence Brigade (BIM), focused on investigating the activities of people who were part of the Socialist Party and those who collaborated with said organization, proceeding to detain members and/or adherents of the aforementioned movement, taking them to secret detention centers maintained by the organization, where they were interrogated under physical duress.

That José (sic) Huaiquiñir Benavides in 1974 was a militant of the Socialist Party of Chile and a member of the Central Committee of said political conglomerate, who on July 27, 1974, was detained at the home of Guillermo Naveas Gramattico by operational agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), being taken to the clandestine detention barracks located at Calle Londres 38, a place where he was tortured, being seen in said facility by other people who were also in the status of detainees.

That the indicated Huaiquiñir Benavides was constantly interrogated under torture and transferred to places outside the facility, among others to Villa Grimaldi, since during 1973 he had served as a union leader at the El Salvador Mineral.

He returned to the Calle Londres 38 barracks, where he remained until the last week of August 1974, the date on which he was transferred to Cuatro Álamos, which was used as a detention and torture center by agents of said organization, where he was also seen by other detainees and was kept deprived of liberty until the month of August 1974, his whereabouts being unknown from that date."

In the civil aspect, the sentence that condemned the state to pay a total compensation of $330,000,000 (three hundred thirty million pesos) for moral damages to the victim's relatives was confirmed.

Source: pjud.cl 2/7/2021

Date: 07-02-2021

Santiago Court condemns three former DINA agents for the aggravated kidnapping of Joel Huaiquiñir.

The appellate court condemned former agents Miguel Krassnoff Martchenko, César Manríquez Bravo, and Orlando Manzo Durán.

In a unanimous ruling, the Santiago Court of Appeals condemned three former agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) to sentences of 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Socialist Party leader Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, an illicit act perpetrated starting on July 27, 1974, in the Metropolitan Region.

Thus, the appellate court confirmed the challenged sentence, issued by visiting judge Miguel Vázquez Plaza, which condemned Krassnoff Martchenko, but revoked it in the part that acquitted Manríquez Bravo and Manzo Durán, after establishing their responsibility in the crime.

The sentence maintains that César Manríquez Bravo did not only fulfill administrative and logistical functions, entirely alien to the operational activities of the BIM, as he maintains in his statements, since the logical and reasonable concatenation and link of the evidence in the process demonstrate irrefutably that from November 1973 until the end of November 1974, he was in command of an entity that coordinated and facilitated the performance of the activities of all the operational brigades destined, in turn, to the clandestine detention of people opposed to the government of the time in Santiago and to their silencing.

Regarding the responsibility of Manzo Durán, it notes that the above allows for the conviction necessary to conclude that Manzo Durán participated as a co-author, in the terms of Article 15 No. 1 of the Penal Code, in the crime of kidnapping in the person of Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, since by prior agreement he ensured that all those who were detained at the disposal of other DINA agents in the clandestine detention center under his charge would not recover their freedom and would remain incommunicado with the outside world.

Next, the ruling points out that according to the cited precept, in what is of interest, authors are considered to be those who take part in the execution of the act immediately and directly; and the truth is that in the case of the crime of kidnapping, the execution of the typical conduct is not exhausted with the act of—to put it in some way—the material or physical 'apprehension' of the kidnapped person, but continues to be executed, and therefore the crime is in the course of consummation as long as the illegitimate confinement or illegitimate deprivation of liberty lasts.

It adds that, consequently, those who perform acts that allow for the perpetuation of that state are strictly executing the conduct described by the type, independent of the prior agreement that may or may not have mediated with other participants.

In other words, their acts are not of simple facilitation of means for the execution or of mere presence without taking direct part in it (in which case the determination of the eventual prior agreement would be relevant to qualify the intervention as authorship or complicity, according to what is provided by Articles 15 No. 3 and 16 of the Penal Code), but are executive acts proper to authorship.

In the civil aspect, the sentence that condemned the state to pay a total compensation of $330,000,000 to the victim's relatives was confirmed.

Source: diarioconstitucional.cl 27/12/2018

Date: 12-27-2018

Miguel Krassnoff adds another 10 years in prison for the kidnapping of a socialist leader

The Fifth Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals condemned former agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) Miguel Krassnoff, César Manríquez, and Orlando Manzo for the crime of aggravated kidnapping against Socialist Party leader Joel Huaiquiñir, which occurred on July 27, 1974.

The court's determination was made after it confirmed the challenged sentence, issued by visiting judge Miguel Vázquez Plaza, which condemned Krassnoff Martchenko but revoked it in the part that acquitted Manríquez Bravo and Manzo Durán, after establishing their responsibility in the crime.

The ruling of the appellate court maintains that "César Manríquez Bravo did not only fulfill administrative and logistical functions, entirely alien to the operational activities of the BIM, as he maintains in his statements, since the logical and reasonable concatenation and link of the evidence in the process demonstrate irrefutably that from November 1973 until the end of November 1974, he was in command of an entity that coordinated and facilitated the performance of the activities of all the operational brigades destined, in turn, to the clandestine detention of people opposed to the government of the time in Santiago and to their silencing."

Furthermore, it states that Durán "participated as a co-author, in the terms of Article 15 No. 1 of the Penal Code, in the crime of kidnapping in the person of Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides, since by prior agreement he ensured that all those who were detained at the disposal of other DINA agents in the clandestine detention center under his charge would not recover their freedom and would remain incommunicado with the outside world."

"Indeed, according to the cited precept, in what is of interest, authors are considered to be those who take part in the execution of the act immediately and directly; and the truth is that in the case of the crime of kidnapping, the execution of the typical conduct is not exhausted with the act of—to put it in some way—the material or physical 'apprehension' of the kidnapped person, but continues to be executed, and therefore the crime is in the course of consummation as long as the illegitimate confinement or illegitimate deprivation of liberty lasts," it adds.

Finally, the Court of Appeals maintains that "those who perform acts that allow for the perpetuation of that state are strictly executing the conduct described by the type, independent of the prior agreement that may or may not have mediated with other participants," that is, "their acts are not of simple facilitation of means for the execution or of mere presence without taking direct part in it, but are executive acts proper to authorship."

Additionally, the court condemned the State to pay an indemnity of 330 million pesos to Huaiquiñir's relatives.

Source: meganoticias.cl 26/12/2018

Date: 12-26-2018

THE MARTYRS OF COBRESAL

The Pinochet dictatorship also claimed lives in our mining area, especially after the passage of the fateful Caravan of Death. Ricardo García Posada, Benito Tapia Tapia, Maguindo Castillo Andrade, as well as Joel Huaiquiñír Benavides, Guillermo Rojas Zamora, Dewet Bascuñan Mourges, and Armando Portilla Portilla were the local names that swelled the list of murders committed with impunity by the Chilean military.

The newspaper La Nación of July 21, 2008, summarizes the episode as follows:

The tragic history of the three victims of Cobresal

...but this is the story of Ricardo García Posada, general manager of Cobresal in El Salvador during the Allende government, and the union leaders of that mine, Benito Tapia Tapia and Maguindo Castillo Andrade. These are the traces of their fatal destiny that remained fixed in the judicial investigation of the Caravan of Death.

At nine in the morning on Wednesday, October 17, 1973, Major Carlos Brito of the Atacama Regiment of Copiapó took Ricardo García out of the public jail. At 19:20 that day, Sergeant Óscar Pastén did the same with Benito Tapia and Maguindo Castillo.

The three were taken to the regiment. "Lobo" Sergio Arellano and his caravan had been in Copiapó since the afternoon of that day, the 17th. They had come from murdering fifteen prisoners in La Serena.

Hours before they were taken out of the jail by Arellano's order, in the early hours of that 17th, 22 kilometers south of Copiapó, thirteen prisoners were massacred in the pampa. The list was made by Arellano.

Led to the place by Captain Patricio Díaz Araneda, in charge of the operation, and Captain Ricardo Yáñez Mora and sub-lieutenants Waldo Ojeda Torrent and Marcelo Marambio Molina, plus a platoon of non-commissioned officers and enlisted men, all from the Atacama, the prisoners were cut with corvos (knives) and their faces disfigured before being riddled with bullets.

Thus, Arellano sought to implicate officers from each local regiment he visited in the crimes.

From the regiment to the cemetery

"Lobo" admitted in his "Testimony," a 1990 manuscript with which he tried to wash the blood from his hands, that he signed "the sentence" of the supposed War Council that had allegedly condemned the three from Cobresal to death. In any case, it was Arellano who included García, Castillo, and Tapia in this second death list, ordering them to be executed in the early hours of Thursday, October 18.

This occurred at four in the morning at the regiment, according to the commander of the Atacama, Óscar Haag. "The execution by firing squad of García, Castillo, and Tapia was directed by Lieutenant Ramón Zúñiga Ormeño, and he was accompanied by Sub-lieutenant Fernando Castillo Cruz," Díaz Araneda declared before Judge Juan Guzmán.

Arturo Araya, assistant to forensic doctor Juan Mendoza, arrived early at the Copiapó morgue that day, the 18th. He saw the three bodies lying on stretchers and covered with white sheets. He uncovered one to undress him and prepare the autopsy, but the cemetery administrator, Leonardo Meza, prevented him. "Those bodies are untouchable," he told him.

Araya managed to see that the victim was wearing a blue suit and had a gold dental filling.

At three in the afternoon of that 18th, Víctor Bravo, an official of the Civil Registry, arrived at the morgue to take the fingerprints of the three bodies. "Mr. García had a gold ring with a ruby and the bullet wounds were all in the chest," Bravo affirmed judicially.

They closed the cemetery, next to the morgue, and the three bodies were buried without coffins in a pit opened in Patio 16. In the entry book, García was assigned number 13, Tapia 14, and Castillo 15.

Informed of the executions by the supposed War Council, the relatives were not admitted to the cemetery.

Days later, Bernardo Pinto, a worker at Cobresal, paid a gravedigger to open the pit, and what he saw he never forgot. "They were without coffins and the three bodies were destroyed, with gashes on the face, the thorax, the legs; sometimes you could see the bones in the wounds." The three bodies disappeared from the cemetery forever.

Rolly Baltiansky, Ricardo García's wife, went into exile in Mexico in 1974 with her daughters Ximena, seven, and Paula, three. When Ximena turned 15, she returned to Chile following the traces of her father. She could not bear his tragic absence. She traveled to the places where he had been, but she never overcame her drama.

On March 16, 1990, when democracy was reborn in Chile, in Mexico City, Ximena doused herself with thinner and died burned. "God, let the turpentine not kill my soul," she wrote in a letter.

National Dignity

July 11, 1998, the day of dignity, the day that commemorates the Nationalization of Copper, was the day chosen by the boards of unions 1 and 6 of El Salvador (today unified union No. 6, Benito Tapia Tapia) to remember and "...pay homage to the martyrs; Benito Tapia, former leader of union No. 6; Ricardo García, former general manager; Maguindo Castillo, former member of the Board of Directors; Guillermo Rojas, first rector of the LDA; Carlos Bascuñán, former journalist for Andino; Armando Portilla, former deputy superintendent of Industrial Relations and Joel Huaiquiñír, former Risk Prevention supervisor, whose names were inscribed on a plaque provided by the FTC and which is on the monolith unveiled by the authorities to keep these names alive" (Revista Andino, July 18, 1988).

Furthermore, during the act, the name of Benito Tapia Tapia was assigned to the avenue where union No. 6 is located (which currently also bears his name).

Subsequently, Ricardo García would also be honored by having his name given to the El Salvador airfield, formerly called El Salvador Bajo, which I will talk about in a future post.

Today, very few know that the stone located in front of the union remembers the martyrs of '73, even more so when (according to sources from the union itself) the commemorative plaque installed on the monolith was stolen the same night it was placed.

Ricardo García Posada, 43 years old, engineer and economist, official of ECLAC (a UN agency) and general manager of Cobresal. He was a member of the Communist Party. Married, two children. The day after the military coup, he officially handed over the mine's facilities to the oldest engineer and presented himself voluntarily to the nearest police station, in Potrerillos.

He remained under house arrest for two days and was then transferred to the Copiapó jail. He was executed by the Caravan of Death; to this day, he remains forcibly disappeared.

Benito Tapia Tapia, 31 years old, employee of Cobresal, national leader of the Confederation of Copper Workers. Although the Rettig Report identified him as a member of the central committee of the Socialist Youth, his wife—María Lía Carvajal—told the judge that Benito had been a candidate for deputy for the Communist Party.

He was detained a week after the coup in El Salvador and then taken to Copiapó. He was executed by the Caravan of Death; his body did not appear in the discovery of the clandestine mass grave and to this day he remains forcibly disappeared.

Maguindo Castillo Andrade, 40 years old, married, one daughter, employee of Cobresal, union leader, was a member of the Socialist Party. He presented himself voluntarily at the Potrerillos police station when called by a military proclamation.

He was released. Three days later he was arrested while walking down a street in El Salvador and transferred to Copiapó. His wife, Laureana Honores, told the judge that she was able to see him several times—swollen hands, bruises on his face—and confirmed that he was being tortured.

He told her nothing, so as not to worry her, but on one occasion he gave her a sweater to wash. Upon submerging it, the water became stained. He was executed by the Caravan of Death; his body did not appear in the discovery of the clandestine mass grave and to this day he remains forcibly disappeared.

Armando Portilla, 48 years old, married, three children, a mechanical operator by profession. He was a director of the National Electricity Company (ENDESA), assistant to the Superintendent of Industrial Relations at the El Salvador Mineral, and a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party.

Detained on December 9, 1976, on a public street, presumably by agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA). The whereabouts of Armando Portilla have been unknown since the date of his detention.

Guillermo Rojas Zamora. Chemistry and biology teacher. He was a victim of forced disappearance on August 6, 1974, in Chañaral. A member of the Socialist Party. Around 9:30 PM, three individuals dressed in civilian clothes, in a car with a license plate from Las Condes, appeared at his home and asked for Haroldo Rojas Zamora.

His spouse replied that he was at the Consolidated School teaching night classes. That same night, around 11:00 PM, the school assistant appeared at his home to deliver some keys and a jacket belonging to her husband, telling her that he had left the establishment with the three civilians.

The officer in charge of the police station confirmed to her that Guillermo Rojas had been detained in transit and that he had later been transferred to Santiago by members of a security service. The National Secretariat of Detainees (SENDET) reported that the teacher was in Cuatro Álamos.

In that facility, they denied his imprisonment. Subsequently, the SENDET reported that he had been released on September 16, 1974.

Joel Huaiquiñír Benavides. Member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party. Industrial Safety Instructor. Former worker at the El Salvador Mineral. He was detained on July 27, 1974, in the commune of Ñuñoa, by DINA troops.

Days later, he was taken to his home, they called his children—aged 5 and 4—to greet him, and four days later, the same civilians went to the house again to look for a change of clothes. In August, the discovery of an arsenal on the slopes of the "Indio Muerto" hill, inside El Salvador, was published in the press, discovered by Intelligence Service personnel after statements made by Joel Huaiquiñir, weapons that would be used to "blow up barracks, police stations, and military installations...".

Huaiquiñir was seen in Cuatro Álamos and Villa Grimaldi; he has been missing since he was taken from Cuatro Álamos, at the end of August or beginning of September 1974, "heading South." Joel Huaiquiñir moved with his family to Santiago when his coworkers Ricardo García Posada, Benito Tapia, and Maguindo Castillo were detained in September 1973 and taken to the Copiapó Regiment, where they were executed by order of General Sergio Arellano Stark.

Source: imagenesdelsalvador.wordpress.com 24/3/2014

Date: 03-24-2014

That year, 14 cases of disappeared persons were amnestied.

One of them was that of Joel Huaiquiñir Benavides. The ruling was pronounced by ministers Roberto Dávila, Adolfo Bañados, Luis Correa Bulo, the participating lawyers Vivian Bullemore and Mario Verdugo, and the Army Auditor General, Fernando Torres Silva.

The majority's foundation was that the criminal action was prescribed since the process had been paralyzed for more than 16 years after the temporary dismissal issued by the first-instance judge (the recent ruling of the Supreme Court established that the prescription runs from the moment the eventual homicide was committed, a date that must be proven); that the declaration of the presumed death of the victim, requested by his spouse, allowed the victim to be considered legally deceased since July 1976, "which also serves to reaffirm the application of DL 2.191 on amnesty"; and that the Geneva Conventions were not applicable because they presuppose a situation of war and, in the investigated facts, the country was only living in a state of internal commotion.

In 1998—as a result of the reform promoted by the then Minister of Justice, Soledad Alvear, which incorporated younger ministers and external lawyers—the Penal Chamber integrated new judges appointed in democracy. Among them, Enrique Cury and Alberto Chaigneau.

In September of that year, the court reopened the case for the disappearance of Enrique Poblete Córdova and rejected granting him amnesty.

One month earlier, however, another ruling had made former military personnel celebrate. The case of Bárbara Uribe and Edwin van Yurick had been amnestied and closed definitively. The accused was Osvaldo Romo Mena.

The Supreme Court pointed out that it would have been materially impossible for him to "continue his participation in the kidnapping" since he had left the country.

Source: November 20, 2004 El Mercurio

Date: 11-20-2004