Address : Teniente Merino Nº9.030, La Florida, Santiago Marital Status : Married, three children Occupation : Furniture Maker Political Affiliation : Deputy General Secretary of the Communist Youth Date of Detention : March 29, 1976

José Arturo Weibel Navarrete, married, father of three, Deputy General Secretary of the Communist Youth, was detained on March 29, 1976, at approximately 08:00 hours, on a public street. He was in the company of his wife, María Teresa Barahona Muñoz, on their way to drop off two of their children at school, traveling on public bus Nº9.046 of the Circunvalación Américo Vespucio route, license plate SL-45, driven by Mr.

Emilio Pozo Avila.

As the bus was traveling along Calle Uno Oriente in the Población Las Lomas de Macul, near the 6.000 block, it was intercepted by three automobiles. Plainclothes agents descended from these vehicles, belonging to the "Comando Conjunto Antisubversivo" (Joint Anti-Subversive Command)—a repressive unit established in 1975 with the objective of suppressing the Communist Party, composed of agents from the Carabineros, the Navy, the Air Force (FACH), and civilians belonging to the Patria y Libertad group.

They boarded the bus through the front and rear doors simultaneously and proceeded to detain José Arturo, supported by other agents who had been traveling on the same bus from the beginning. At that moment, to justify their repressive maneuver, the agents accused the victim of stealing a purse from a female passenger on the bus.

In the days prior to his detention, José Arturo had been followed and surveilled by civilians who had previously belonged to the far-right group "Patria y Libertad" and were, at that time, agents of the Joint Command under the command of civilian César Luis Palma Ramírez, alias "El Fifo." Thus, on March 29, 1976, the Weibel Barahona family was followed from the moment they left their home until they boarded the bus.

At the following stops, agents began to board the bus, one at each stop, until a total of four were on board.

The detention, as previously noted, was witnessed by the bus driver and passengers, as well as by Weibel’s spouse and their children, Mauricio and Alvaro Weibel Barahona, nine and seven years old, respectively.

The group of agents that participated in the operation included, among others, "Alex"; "Huaso" Flores; Raúl Horacio González Fernández, alias "Rodrigo"; "Jano"; "Nano"; "Lolo"; "Wally"; Daniel Guimpert Corvalán; Viviana Ugarte Sandoval, alias "la Pochi"; and two female Navy agents, in addition to agent Andrés Antonio Valenzuela Morales, who later testified regarding these events.

He further noted that "that operation was followed by radio, from a vehicle, by the Director of Intelligence, General Enrique Ruiz Bunger, as he wished to know how the 'Fifo' Palma group operated. I know this because I was present when 'Fifo' commented that the General sent his congratulations to the group for their performance in the operation."

From the site of his detention, José Arturo Weibel Navarrete was taken by his captors to the building of the expropriated and closed newspaper "El Clarín," located at Calle Dieciocho Nº229, Santiago. This facility was used, at times, by the Joint Anti-Subversive Command as a clandestine detention center, referred to as "La Firma" by the agents themselves.

Other detainees held at that facility included fellow Communist Party militants Luciano Mallea, Adrián Saravia, Alfredo Vargas, Carlos Paredes, Blanca Allende, Marta Ester Moreno, Víctor Cárdenas Valderrama, Juan René Orellana Catalán (forcibly disappeared), Luis Maturana González (forcibly disappeared), Juan Gianelli Company (forcibly disappeared), and Manuel Guerrero Ceballos (political execution).

Information gathered from detainees who were later released indicates that "La Firma" was located at the rear of the building occupied by the Carabineros Directorate of Communications (DICOMCAR), where the institution's Intelligence School operated. The two buildings were connected by a hole in the partition wall between the two properties.

In the "interrogation" room of that facility, there were organizational charts detailing the structure of the Communist Party, listing the names of its members, positions, and other specifications. When one of them was detained, a cross was placed over their name, and the name of their potential replacement was added.

Likewise, there was a filing cabinet with photographs and personal data of the militants. There, José Weibel Navarrete was tortured and interrogated and, days later, transferred along with other detainees to a house at Bellavista N°122, across from some tennis courts, a place that single agents used as housing.

That house had been inhabited by another communist militant, Sergio Buschmann, until the end of December 1975, and the DIFA (Air Force Intelligence Directorate) had occupied it illegally. José Arturo remained in the Bellavista house for a week, after which he was taken to the Cajón del Maipo where, according to agent Luis Palma Ramírez, he was executed and his body abandoned.

To this date, his remains have not been located. In that area, near the date of the events described, three bodies were discovered, which led his spouse to go to the Legal Medical Institute to attempt to identify his body among them.

However, due to the state of decomposition, identification was impossible. Later, María Teresa Barahona went to the Institute with José Weibel's dental records, at which time the medical examiner informed her that the bodies were not her husband's.

Subsequently, seven other bodies were found in the Cajón del Maipo, without it being possible to establish if any of them corresponded to José Arturo. Most of these bodies were found without clothing and with their limbs bound with wire.

It is important to note that since July 5, 1975, José Arturo had been sought by the repressive agencies. On that date, he was sought at his mother-in-law's house. Between January and February 1976, his house was placed under surveillance. On October 26, 1975, his brother Ricardo was detained and also forcibly disappeared.

On that same day, March 29, between 10:00 and 12:00 hours, José Weibel, blindfolded, was taken by his captors to his home—at a time when his wife was not there—and they proceeded to raid and loot the residence.

Neighbors in the area witnessed these events. In April 1976, the home was raided for a second time in the absence of its residents. On this occasion, neighbors prevented the theft of property, which was abandoned outside the house. These items were delivered to the Carabineros of Macul, who, despite returning them, did not make a record of what had occurred.

Similarly, after his detention, José Arturo's spouse was subjected to personal surveillance, and her mother-in-law's home was under constant watch by plainclothes personnel; she even received death threats.

Judicial and/or Administrative Proceedings

On March 29, 1976, a Writ of Amparo (Habeas Corpus), file Nº251-76, was filed with the Santiago Court of Appeals on behalf of José Arturo Weibel Navarrete. It was rejected on June 3, 1976, based solely on a report from the Ministry of the Interior, which denied that the detention had been ordered by that State Secretariat.

The records were sent to the Eighth Criminal Court of Santiago to investigate the possible commission of a crime.

On June 18, 1976, a new Writ of Amparo, file Nº539-76, was filed. It was rejected on July 21, 1976, dismissing the suggestion of Minister Paillás, who had been in favor of issuing an order to the Ministry of the Interior and the DINA to report on the status of the detainee. This resolution was confirmed by the Supreme Court on July 27, 1976.

Despite this, on July 22, 1976, a third Writ of Amparo, file 635-76, was filed with the Santiago Court of Appeals on behalf of José Arturo Weibel Navarrete. It was rejected on July 30, 1976, on the grounds that "there is no evidence to show that the detainee is being held; a possible crime is being investigated in the respective Tribunal." On November 3, 1976, the Supreme Court confirmed the resolution.

On April 2, 1976, María Teresa Barahona filed a criminal complaint, file Nº5832-3, with the 11th Criminal Court of Santiago for the kidnapping of her spouse, trespassing, and robbery. The ex-officio complaint initiated before the Eighth Criminal Court was consolidated with it.

Eyewitnesses to the detention, including the bus driver, testified in the proceedings, as did those who witnessed the raid on the victim's home by State agents. Both the DINA and the Ministry of the Interior responded that they had no record of Weibel's detention.

The Tribunal requested, and reiterated on several occasions, that the National Directorate of Social Communication (DINACOS) send the official text of its statements regarding the "mailbox houses," linking them to the names of the communist leaders detained at that time, but that agency never responded.

On February 23, 1977, three important investigative steps were requested: the constitution of the Tribunal at the site of the detention; the interrogation of witnesses; and the constitution of the Tribunal at the DINA facilities. All were denied.

On May 4, 1978, the case was definitively dismissed by virtue of D.L. 2191 (Amnesty Law). On June 16, the Santiago Court of Appeals revoked the dismissal, ordering the investigation to continue. On April 4, 1979, Visiting Minister Servando Jordán requested to take over the case, and it was transferred to him.

On May 23, 1980, the summary proceedings were closed again, and on September 29 of that same year, the resolution was confirmed by the Court of Appeals.

Important information regarding the circumstances of José Weibel's detention was gathered as a result of judicial action for other forcibly disappeared persons. Indeed, following the detention and disappearance of 13 high-ranking leaders of leftist political parties—11 from the Communist Party and 2 from the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR)—in November and December 1976, and after the respective Writs of Amparo were rejected, the families of those victims requested that the Supreme Court appoint a Visiting Minister.

To investigate such an irregular situation, Minister Guastavino was appointed. After the Ministry of the Interior reported that the affected individuals had left the country through a mountain pass toward the Argentine Republic, he dismissed the case.

That resolution was revoked by the Santiago Court of Appeals, as was the case the second time a new closure of the summary proceedings was decreed.

Subsequently, Minister Carlos Letelier Bobadilla, who replaced the previous Minister, took charge of the proceedings—known as the "case of the thirteen." The summary was closed in August 1978, with the finding that "no progress could be made in the investigation."

This resolution was challenged by lawyers who pointed out to the Minister that progress could indeed be made, as there were pending investigative steps that had been requested and others would arise from the state of the proceedings. Thus, Minister Letelier set aside his own resolution and ordered further investigative steps.

Later, upon resuming his duties, Minister Guastavino decreed a definitive dismissal by application of D.L. 2.191 in December 1980. The Court of Appeals, this time, revoked the resolution to close the summary, and the Visiting Minister himself set aside the dismissal he had decreed, due to the omission of a legal formality. In this way, the proceedings continued.

By 1983, Minister Carlos Cerda Fernández took charge of the investigation into the "case of the thirteen." The Minister ordered hundreds of investigative steps, consisting of summoning individuals, identifying locations and persons, expert reports, reviewing criminal files, and dispatching official letters requesting reports from State services, branches of the Armed Forces, private institutions, and others of vital importance.

In total, he received nearly 200 testimonies from eyewitnesses to the detentions of the victims and their confinement in clandestine centers. These testimonies included those of members of the Armed Forces who participated in Intelligence Services, as well as officials from the Carabineros and the Investigations police.

Also included were the testimonies of civilians who collaborated with the Security Services, such as Otto Trujillo and Miguel Estay Reyno ("El Fanta").

The declaration of the first-class soldier of the Chilean Air Force, Andrés Valenzuela Morales—who deserted from the institution in 1984—was also obtained. Through his statement, he provided accounts and data regarding the operation, beginning in the mid-70s, of a so-called Joint Command or Joint Anti-Subversive Command, composed of members of the various branches of the Armed Forces and Order, plus some civilians who had belonged to leftist parties and who, after being detained by the Intelligence Services and subjected to pressure and/or extortion, became collaborators.

This Command had material resources at its disposal, such as vehicles, weaponry, transmission equipment, and clandestine detention centers.

At this stage of the investigation, Minister Carlos Cerda established valuable and clarifying data regarding other cases of human rights violations, some of them involving the disappearance of persons, even ordering the transfer of some parts of the "case of the thirteen" to other Tribunals handling criminal cases related to them. Among the latter is the case of José Arturo Weibel Navarrete.

Faced with the Supreme Court's refusal of Minister Cerda's request to extend his Extraordinary Visit to include the present crime, the magistrate ordered on August 14, 1986, that duly authorized copies of the following parts of the process be sent to the Eleventh Criminal Court of Santiago, as they pertained to file N°5.832, which was being substantiated for the crime of kidnapping the victim and was, at the time, temporarily dismissed:

Those on pages 3.255 and 3.256, containing the judicial statements given on June 17 and 28, 1985, by Emilio Pozo Avila and Julio César Berríos, driver and passenger, respectively, of the public bus on the Centro-La Florida route, from which José Weibel Navarrete was taken by plainclothes agents who claimed to be "police."

The one on page 3.932, containing the statement given to Minister Cerda on October 31, 1985, by Elsa Lagunas Sotomayor, who was an eyewitness to the detention of her brother, Mauricio Lagunas Sotomayor, and Miguel Estay Reyno, both of which occurred on December 22, 1975, at their home in the La Florida commune.

In it, the declarant states that the arrest was carried out by a group of armed subjects dressed in civilian clothes, among whom stood out a tall individual (about 1.90 meters), with fair skin, light eyes, black hair, a very well-formed nose, and very thick eyebrows, all of whom entered the property violently.

The witness continued by relating that during the operation, one of the agents approached her and interrogated her about the address of José Weibel Navarrete, which she did not know.

Finally, when shown photographs of Joint Command agents, the witness focused on the photos on page 3.563 and following (corresponding to Roberto Fuentes Morrison), stating that they appeared to be the tall captor with fair skin and light eyes, finding him very similar, although at the time of the events described, he looked younger and had a black mustache.

The one on page 3.988 vta., containing the judicial statement dated November 5, 1985, given by the spouse of the forcibly disappeared detainee and brother of the victim, Ricardo Weibel Navarrete, Mrs. Catalina Avendaño Leal.

In it, the witness stated that after her husband's release on November 6, 1975—during his first detention—he told her that he had been held at the Colina Air Base, where he was interrogated and tortured.

She added that he had been taken from the facility, put in the seat of a red Austin Mini car, and driven to the home of his brother, José Weibel, in order to arrest him, which did not happen as the victim was not there. She also noted that his captors demanded that he indicate the victim's whereabouts.

Finally, the declarant indicated that she had been able to recognize one of the agents who participated in her husband's detention, who acted as the leader, as Roberto Fuentes Morrison, from photographs that appeared in various media outlets.

The one on page 4.393, corresponding to the statement given to Minister Cerda on November 16, 1985, by the victim's spouse, María Teresa Barahona Muñoz.

In it, she ratifies the facts that culminated in her spouse's arrest on March 29, 1976, as an eyewitness, adding that both the victim and his family had been subjected to overt following and surveillance prior to the detention.

The one on page 7.233, corresponding to a sworn statement signed abroad by the former FACH member and member of the so-called Joint Command, Andrés Antonio Valenzuela Morales, which was added to the case file.

In it, the declarant provides detailed descriptions of the type of weaponry, vehicles, and clandestine centers used by the Joint Command. Regarding the latter: a hangar located inside the Cerrillos Airport; a property located at Calle Santa Teresa N°037, Paradero 20 of the Gran Avenida, known as "Nido 20"; a property located at Calle Perú N°9.053, Paradero 18 of Vicuña Mackenna, called "Nido 18"; a facility inside the Colina Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment, known as "Remo Cero"; a property located on Calle Dieciocho in the capital, in the former offices of the newspaper "El Clarín," called "La Firma"; and a house for the accommodation of single personnel, located in Bellavista.

Regarding the kidnappings, Valenzuela Morales stated that in 1975, agents would go to the homes or workplaces of the victims to detain them, claiming to belong to the Investigations police. By 1976, detentions were carried out primarily on the street, without witnesses. José Weibel Navarrete was one of the last forcibly disappeared persons to be detained in the presence of family members.

Finally, the witness provided the physical descriptions of several Joint Command agents known by nicknames or indicated by their names or surnames: "Larry" (Carabineros Sergeant Major); "Tito" and "Jano" (Carabineros); "Pochi" (female agent); "Alex" (Navy); "Yerko" and "Patán" (civilians who had belonged to Patria y Libertad); "Yoyopulus" and "Zambra" (from Investigations, who only operated at the Air War Academy); Guimper (Navy Lieutenant); Forero (doctor); Otto Trujillo (civilian FACH employee); "Fifo" Palma Ramírez (civilian who had belonged to Patria y Libertad); "Wally" (Roberto Fuentes Morrison); and the former communist militants who, after being detained by the Command, collaborated with the group, including Miguel Estay ("El Fanta").

From the document on page 2.426, which corresponds to the sworn statements given before a Notary Public by the former FACH member, Andrés Antonio Valenzuela Morales, in the months of August and October 1984, which were submitted to the case.

From the document on page 3.278, containing an authorized copy of a sworn statement given on December 31, 1976, by Manuel Leonidas Guerrero Ceballos, in which he stated that he had been detained by security agents in the city of Santiago on June 14, 1976, and taken to a clandestine facility he could not identify, where he was tortured and interrogated.

During the course of his interrogations—he added—José Arturo Weibel Navarrete was mentioned to him, while his captors boasted of having detained the victim and of the circumstances of his arrest, which they described in detail.

From the document on page 3.986, which contains the composite sketches, prepared by the Investigations Police, of two of the subjects who participated in the detention of the victim on March 29, 1976.

Despite Minister Cerda's work, specifically in ordering the transfer of the noted documents to the Eleventh Criminal Court of Santiago so that, with the new evidence provided, the resolution of temporary dismissal could be revoked and the investigation continued, there is no record that this occurred.

For further information regarding the so-called "case of the thirteen," substantiated primarily by the Extraordinary Visiting Minister Mr. Carlos Cerda Fernández, see the file detailing the detention and subsequent disappearance of the communist militant, Reinalda Pereira Plaza.

On the other hand, on August 1, 1978, the families of 70 disappeared persons, including those of José Weibel Navarrete, filed a criminal complaint with the 10th Criminal Court of Santiago for the crime of aggravated kidnapping against General (R) Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda, Army Colonel Marcelo Luis Moren Brito, and Army Lieutenant Colonel Rolf Gonzalo Wenderoth Pozo.

The identities of other agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), information on the secret detention centers of said organization, and other data regarding its structure and the resources at the DINA's disposal were also provided to the Tribunal.

Without carrying out any investigative steps, on August 10 of that year, the Judge of the 10th Court declared herself incompetent and sent the records to the Military Justice system. After several appeals, in May 1979, the case was filed with the 2nd Military Prosecutor's Office of Santiago, under file N° 553-78.

In 1983, the Tribunal reviewed the four volumes of the Extraordinary Visit for cases of forcibly disappeared persons in the Metropolitan Region, which was substantiated by Minister Servando Jordán; they contained important information regarding the actions of the DINA and the responsibility of that security agency in the cases of hundreds of forcibly disappeared persons.

Without any investigative steps being taken for four years, on November 20, 1989, Army Lieutenant Colonel Enrique Ibarra Chamorro, Military Prosecutor General, requested the application of the Amnesty Decree Law (D.L. 2.191) for this case, because the proceedings had the exclusive purpose of investigating alleged crimes that occurred during the period between September 11, 1973, and March 10, 1978, and because, during the 10 years of processing, it had not been possible to "determine the responsibility of any person." On November 30, 1989, the request was accepted by the 2nd Military Court, which dismissed the case totally and definitively—which was still in the summary stage—on the grounds that "the criminal responsibility of the persons allegedly implicated in the reported events has been extinguished." The plaintiff parties appealed the resolution to the Court Martial, which confirmed the ruling in January 1992. A Complaint Appeal was then filed with the Supreme Court of Justice, which, as of December 1992, had not yet issued its resolution.

(Complete records of the complaint against Manuel Contreras can be found in the case of Eduardo Alarcón Jara, July 30, 1974).

Full text of one of the sworn statements made by the former agent of the Chilean Air Force (FACH), Andres Valenzuela Morales, to the Vicariate of Solidarity at the end of 1985.

Appears

Andres Antonio Valenzuela Morales Identity Card 5.443.690-4, from Renca, born on November 30, 1956, in Papudo, residing at Pasaje Barranquilla 2044, Poblacion Juanita Aguirre, Conchali, married, who under oath states:

I entered Military Service in April 1974, at the Regimiento de Artillería Antiaérea de Colina, where I spent 3 months, before being assigned to the Academia de Guerra Aérea, located in the Las Condes commune of Santiago.

I arrived at this facility along with a group of approximately 60 conscripts, 15 of whom were placed under the authority of the Aviation Prosecutor's Office, while the rest remained as AGA personnel, performing surveillance and other routine duties.

The person in charge of our entire group was an officer named (NN)(1), who unified intelligence operations against subversion, which at that time were directed primarily against the MIR. There is very little I can say about what happened in that facility, since I was only assigned to surveillance duty (2).

After our work at the Academy of War, the entire group moved to a house located on Avenida Apoquindo, a property that no longer exists, as a bank was built there. When we moved, we took about 15 MIR detainees with us.

I remember a MIR member with the surname Pérez who went abroad, and who was visited by his wife at the detention center. I also remember a female MIR militant they called "la Negra": she was tall, with short hair. I do not know what happened to her.

We were in this Apoquindo facility for about 3 months, more or less. We carried out raids and arrests. I participated in the "Reaction" Force, meaning I provided security for those conducting the operations against any possible attack in the surrounding area.

The detained persons were either released or sent to prison. In this facility, the group was also led by (NN), and one of his closest subordinates was (NN), who was nicknamed "Wally" [3].

Very shortly thereafter, we began to run out of detainees, as the repression of the MIR became the responsibility of the DINA, so we moved to the building at Santa Rosa and Alameda, where the "Intelligence Community" was located—that is, all institutional services, except for the DINA.

At this location, our team dissolved, and each of us went to different offices. The FACH member Guillermo Bratti Cornejo, who had been working in my group, went to El Bosque, as that was his unit; he was nicknamed "el pelao Lito."

There were other FACH officials nicknamed "Patricio," "Chirola," all from the El Bosque Unit.

When the year 1975 began, the group reunited with (NN), Bratti, and the others, except for those from the Base El Bosque, and we went to operate out of a small hangar located at the Cerrillos airport, entering through the main gate, immediately to the right, in the direction of the coast, currently located almost in front of a large sign that says "40 KMS. VEL. MAX."

(NN), who was from "Patria y Libertad," was added to our group (I clarify that I do not know if his name was Luis or Cesar or both, but I am sure of his two surnames).

This individual arrived with a team of civilians: "Luti," "Yerko," "Patén," and others. This (NN) had been convicted for the death of Salvador Allende's Naval Aide-de-Camp and, apparently, his team had also acted in that event. It was a team that acted very professionally. I must reiterate that (NN) was also integrated into this team and was one of its leaders.

Our task was to work on the repression of the Southern Regional of the Communist Party. I remember that one night a search was conducted, in which I did not participate, where about 12 militants were captured.

Appearing on the scene at this time—the beginning of the third quarter of the year—was "Juanca," who was Carol Fedor Flores Castillo, who had been a militant of the Communist Party and whom I had seen detained in 1974 at the AGA.

The nickname "Juanca" derived from his war name, Juan Carlos. In any case, at this time he participated in the interrogations of detainees, providing the greatest amount of data, since he knew an immense number of militants.

He was just another agent, and he was even provided with a house that had been requisitioned from the MIR and was located in the La Florida commune. He carried a weapon, an intercom, went to our shooting practices, and entered the institution's facilities like any of us.

During this period, probably in September 1975, "Quila Leo," who had been a former ship's boy in the Navy, was detained; I do not remember exactly if he was a militant of the Communist Youth or the Communist Party, and I identify him unequivocally by the photo shown to me as Miguel Angel Rodríguez Gallardo. I spoke with him many times, as he was detained for a long time.

Due to the lack of comfort in this place (there was not even water), we moved to a house located at Santa Teresa 037, near the 20th stop of Gran Avenida, known as "NIDO 20."

This was a house where the neighborhood could clearly notice what was happening inside, as people were entering and leaving. There were 2 external guards in uniform, always stationed outside, who were prohibited from entering the house and were always students from the School of Specialties.

This house had a fireplace in the living room and three bedrooms. We arrived there with about 20 detainees, more or less, who were overcrowded to such an extent that closets were used as punishment cells: "Quila Leo" was locked in there to ensure incommunicado status.

From here, detainees began to be taken out to be interrogated in another place, which I also knew. It is located at the 18th stop of Vicuña Mackenna, at Calle Perú No. 9053, which was reached by entering through Rojas Magallanes and turning right onto the street I have indicated. This place was known as "NIDO 18." The property had been requisitioned from a MIR militant with the surname Sotomayor.

In this facility, torture and interrogation took place.

When the "NIDO 20" and "NIDO 18" facilities began to be used, we acted in a joint command with members of the institutional services of Carabineros and the Navy. For the Carabineros, the command was held by a lieutenant nicknamed "El Lolo," with the surname (NN), today a captain of the Carabineros and Chief of the Repressive Operational Group of Carabineros that has commanded the repression in Pudahuel in recent months.

For the Navy, a lieutenant (now retired) (NN) also participated in command (today he works in the import of security elements and Winchester arms businesses and has an office in Bulnes).

I can remember, without determining the exact dates, that two people died at NIDO 20; one, I remember they called him Yuri, arrived sick; he was short, curly-haired, with short brown hair; he worked at the Municipality of La Granja or Cisterna and had been detained at his workplace. He died of fulminant bronchopneumonia, as they had him hanging in the bathroom.

In addition, they brought a detainee from NIDO 18 to 20 whom they called "Chino," or "Comrade"; he was short, about 50 years old, stocky. He arrived heavily tortured from NIDO 18 and was with us for about 15 days.

In the end, a group of civilians arrived at night; I do not know if they were from Patria y Libertad or the DINA (I doubt this, because there was great rivalry with that Service, to the point that sometimes we looked for people they already had detained or vice versa, without us knowing it).

Well, they beat this man by forming a circle, throwing him around and hitting him among themselves. I was on guard duty, and it infuriated us that they were beating him senselessly, since they barely asked him anything.

In the end, they left him lying on the floor, next to the fireplace, and left. On their way out, they met (NN), who was just arriving and who did not participate in that action. That detainee had a very bad night, and in the morning, the internal sentry realized he was dead.

At noon, (NN) returned with clothes (I am almost sure they were the detainee's own) and a razor. They shaved him and changed the corpse's clothes, and then they took him out in a vehicle, supposedly to hand him over to his family. I never heard of him again.

Now I remember that Yuri, who also died, was taken dead to NIDO 18, and from there they made him disappear, as a Navy agent told me, by throwing him into the sea. I also remember now that a Navy group is still operating in the NIDO 18 house and I also know that they have modified the front of the site.

There was also a detainee who was bald, who claimed to have been a boxing champion and was a taxi driver. He lived on Gran Avenida; he was there for about two months and turned in a person who worked at Madeco, who led us to an arsenal of AK submachine guns, which the DINA took.

In reality, I never knew if he was a militant of the MIR or the PC, but I was surprised that after this he was released with impunity. At NIDO 18, 2 brothers were detained, I calculate about 38 to 40 years old. One of them was wearing a brown leather jacket and hanged himself in the isolation cell. The other brother was apparently released.

Miguel Angel Rodríguez Gallardo, or "el Quila Leo," remained detained in these facilities. At NIDO 18, I remember there was a person who tried to commit suicide by climbing a stepladder and only managed to break an arm.

According to the photos I have seen of the disappeared from 1975, he could look very much like Humberto Fuentes Rodríguez, and I seem to remember they called him "old man Fuentes" [4].

In this account, we are placing ourselves approximately in the month of November 1975, a time when we moved, with several detainees, to the Regimiento de Artillería Antiaérea de la FACH. Inside that Regiment, there is a prison called La Prevención, which is not used today, except to store equipment.

We arrived with about 20 detainees from NIDOS 18 and 20; Quila Leo was there, the bald man with the cast on his arm, and others I do not remember.

About two days after arriving at that facility, an operation was mounted in the northern sector of Santiago, and Ricardo Weibel was detained in the El Salto neighborhood, near the Regimiento Buin. He was taken from his house; I recognize him now unequivocally from the photo of him shown to me; he is one of the people I spoke with the most.

Also detained in that sector was a young man who was a very good caricaturist (he made drawings of almost all of us); Bezoa, named René, was detained; and the two "Fanta" brothers were detained; the younger one was detained with his girlfriend, and I do not remember their names. The girlfriend was thin, short, and dark-skinned.

All of them were interrogated, and many more detainees continued to fall.

When we were in Colina, Army personnel joined our group, under the command of an officer who rotated frequently. They worked for a short time.

This Army personnel interrogated one of the detainees on one occasion, who, due to the electricity applied at 200 direct volts, died of cardiac arrest. The detainee was about 50 years old and had almost a full set of dentures. He remained dead almost all night in his cell and was taken out by the same Army team, who put him in the trunk of a Chevy Nova car and took him away.

After this incident, the Army separated from the Joint Command.

While Ricardo Weibel was detained for the first time, a helicopter arrived; I do not remember exactly if it was from the FACH or the Army, and I also do not remember if it was a UH or PUMA type. They took about 10 or 15 detainees in the aircraft to throw them into the sea.

The agent (NN), alias "Pifo," participated in this operation for the FACH, and there was personnel from the other institutions. As I recall, the following detainees were taken: the bald man with the fractured and casted arm; a former councilman of Renca from the Communist Party, who was lame, wore orthopedic shoes, and was of mature age, about 50 years old; the caricaturist also went.

This affected Ricardo Weibel a lot, as he talked a lot with the latter detainee because they were in neighboring cells; every time Weibel heard the sound of a helicopter, he would tremble intensely.

The agent (NN) said that they threw them into the sea off the coast of San Antonio. Because he explained that the bald detainee with the broken arm, whom they called "old man Fuentes," woke up when they were going to throw him into the sea, I wish to clarify that the detainees were drugged. (NN) commented that one of the Army agents, in cold blood, hit the detainee with the arm fracture on the head with an iron bar and threw him down; for this reason, I know they threw them into the sea.

After this event, they released several people, including the young Fanta and his girlfriend, Ricardo Weibel, and others I do not remember.

Bezoa and the older Fanta were already performing informant tasks at this time. I knew this because they were taken out of the cells to a place, their blindfolds and handcuffs were removed, and they were treated with great preference; I clarify that when conducting the interrogations, the older Fanta wrote the statements; behind the interrogated person, who was blindfolded, Bezoa would affirm or deny with signs depending on what the detainee said.

I believe the young Fanta never collaborated.

Ricardo Weibel was detained a few days later for the second time; the agent (NN) went to drop him off and pick him up again at his house, telling his wife that it would be an interrogation of a few days and that he would have no problems; they took him to Colina again.

In this facility, he suspected that they were going to kill him, because they did not interrogate him, did not blindfold him, and let him move around. Indeed, a few days, more than a week, during which he saw Carol Flores act as just another agent and Bezoa and Fanta collaborate and have coffee and other food with us, etc. (I reiterate that Bezoa and Fanta were always there as detainees collaborating, while Carol Flores was just another agent).

On this occasion, a vehicle appeared, which was a Citroën van. They threw several detainees into it, among whom were Quila Leo and Ricardo Weibel. There was also a thin detainee, about 28 to 30 years old, who had already tried to commit suicide in his cell by cutting his veins with a metal pin from his pants that he had sharpened on the cement until it became a cutting weapon; on that occasion, they took him to the FACH Hospital, where he recovered, and now they were taking him to kill him anyway.

In the vehicle, they placed crowbars, shovels, and a canister of fuel. As agents in this operation, Bratti, Flores, (NN), and other agents from the other institutions participated, who went in another vehicle.

They returned the same day, after about 4 hours, without the detainees. I am absolutely sure, because one of the agents told me, that they were murdered on the military grounds of Peldehue; I also wish to highlight that, as I did not participate in the operation, before leaving, they gave me the detainees' identity cards, their driver's licenses, watches, glasses, wallets (Weibel's had many photos); I had to burn and bury those things.

I do not remember any more important facts and data for now that occurred in Colina in relation to the detainees. An exceptional circumstance that moved everyone was when Guillermo Bratti and Carol Flores and (NN) (who also came from the AGA and was a Patria y Libertad member) were detained; according to (NN), they were detained because they had passed information to the Communist Party and the MIR, but that explanation did not satisfy us, as it was normal for whoever fell into disgrace to be discredited so that they would be hated; these detained agents were left blindfolded and in cells.

Another version we learned of their detention was that they had given information, which we possessed, to the DINA, which carried out operations harming our group; the DINA, according to them, had offered them more money, a vehicle, and a house.

This was declared by Bratti, and I heard it on a recorded tape of his interrogation years later. They were moved away from us, and at that moment it was decided that Bratti would be discharged and the others marginalized from the institution.

In the summer of 1976, we finished operating in the Colina facility, which surely happened at the beginning of March; we moved to a facility they called "la Firma," which is located almost in front of where the SIAL is.

And it was a building of the newspaper El Clarín, located on Calle Dieciocho in Santiago. Today, the DICOMCAR occupies that place, and "el Lolo" works there, who I have already said is a Carabineros captain with the surname (NN), and in that place, interrogations of people detained in Pudahuel have been carried out in recent weeks.

I know this because, for an operation in which about 200 people were detained in one night, "el Lolo" asked for support from my services, and there I was able to find out that that facility I knew as "la Firma" is used by DICOMCAR.

Returning to the account of the year 1976, I can point out that just after arriving at this facility in March 76, an operation was mounted to detain José Weibel Navarrete, brother of the previous one, which was executed by a Patria y Libertad group that operated with (NN).

We supported this group in the following way: it was my turn to go with other agents on the bus in which "Checho Weibel" was traveling with his wife and child; I was sitting in the back. And we were not clear how we were going to get the man off.

In an instant, an effective snatch-theft occurred (it was not invented). A boy of about 14 or 15 years old stole a purse from a lady. At that minute, one of the Navy agents pointed to Weibel, saying "that one did it," and asked the driver to stop the bus to get him off; he was immediately put into a vehicle, and I left in another vehicle, ending the operation; we all went to "la Firma." As soon as we arrived, they interrogated him, but not for very long.

Days later, due to an inspection that was believed to be going to occur by a human rights group, Weibel, Fanta, and Bezoa were moved to a three-story house located on Calle Bellavista, almost in front of the tennis courts (it still exists), and which was the house where we bachelors slept.

The detainees were there for a week. One night when I was off duty, they took Weibel out and made him disappear. I am sure they killed him, because (NN) indicated that he had been thrown inside the Cajón del Maipo, which had an unequivocal meaning for me, because of what I am going to relate. Before

I wish to state that Bezoa and el Fanta were released during that period.

I will now recount my experience regarding the Cajón del Maipo. A few weeks after what happened with Weibel, an operation was organized in which I had to participate. (NN) picked me up at the house in Bellavista and told me I had to accompany him.

He was in his Tormo car. I found it strange that I was the only one from the troop going. We went to the "la Firma" facility, where "el Lolo", (NN), (NN), and other agents from Patria y Libertad were present.

There was a table with items, as if for a cocktail party. I helped myself, even though I did not understand anything that was happening; upon finishing, they told the sentry to bring the package (it was a detainee).

To my surprise, they brought Bratti in, handcuffed, blindfolded, and drugged. Then they began telling him that he had messed up by betraying the cause and other similar things. They put him in the trunk of a car, and we left in two vehicles.

I was in the one driven by (NN), heading toward the Cajón del Maipo. As we were leaving, they gave me a pill, which some agents also took. (NN) drove the route with great confidence, and after passing a bridge where the river crosses from left to right, he turned left onto a road located on the eastern slope in that sector; he stopped at a place about 7 km inside and about 40 meters from some cliffs.

They took Bratti down, blindfolded, and (NN) placed him near a rock and said to him: "How do you want to die?", he also wanted to play a macabre game with him, as he kept saying "if you want, run, and I'll chase you." He was half-drunk.

Bratti told him "take off the handcuffs and the blindfold." I had to take them off, and he immediately sent me to the vehicle to look for ropes and wire. When I reached the car and began to take the things out of the trunk, I heard a burst of submachine gun fire with a silencer.

Upon returning to the site, I saw that (NN) was finishing him off. I did not see the others shoot. They asked me to tie him by the feet and hands, but I do not remember if they were behind his back or in front.

Ballast stones were placed on him; they signaled for me to push him over the cliff, but since there were some bushes, the body had to be moved out into the void. Someone grabbed me by the hand and I was left hanging, coming to think at one point that they were going to kill me too, but in the end, he fell into the water and we all returned.

I know that Carol Flores was also killed, but I cannot remember if it was days before or days after Bratti. (NN) made an allusion that it was the same place or sector.

After this, we continued working at "la Firma," with Bezoa and el Fanta appearing as collaborators of the Service.

A repression began against more PC militants. "José" was detained, who later gave up the meeting point where he was to meet with Contreras Maluje; "el Macaco," who was in charge of finances for the Communist Party Youth, was also detained (the "Macaco" had a small apartment in the center); someone they called "el Vicario" was detained, as well as another man who repaired watches; there were about eight or nine people.

When José indicated that he had to meet with Contreras Maluje at a house in the Gran Avenida sector, the operation was set up, and Contreras Maluje was detained after José left. Contreras Maluje was accompanied by two girls and, upon seeing us, he fled for several blocks, so they had to follow him and subdue him among ten men, as he was very sturdy.

He was loaded into a Volkswagen Kleinbus van, which belonged to the Navy. The driver was so nervous that, on the way along Gran Avenida, he ran over a pedestrian.

We arrived at "la Firma," where they interrogated Contreras Maluje regarding "José," with the goal of covering for him so he would not realize that it was because of him that he had been detained. Contreras Maluje said nothing.

At one point, when they were applying electricity to him, they lifted him up and made him take off his blindfold, seeing his fellow detainees sitting in front of him, watching him. On the wall of that room was an organizational chart of the Youth, where the names of the detainees were marked in red.

I do not remember there being any other detainees besides "José," "el Vicario," "el Macaco," "the watchmaker," and others whom I cannot identify.

Contreras invented a meeting point for the following day, in the Nataniel street sector. The operation was set up, and Contreras walked along Nataniel in the direction of Avda. Matta (at that time, traffic was coming north).

At one point, it was heard over the radio in my vehicle that we should go to the sector thinking it was an accident; we arrived almost at the same time as the vehicle in which (NN) was traveling and a Carabineros jeep that happened to pass by.

We realized that Contreras had thrown himself under the wheels of the bus, and while trying to get up, he shouted: "I am a communist and it is no sin, notify the Maluje Pharmacy in Concepción." He shouted his name and his position in the Party.

He asked the Carabineros for help, begging them not to leave him in our hands, telling them "They are from the DINA," pointing at (NN) and telling them: "That is the boss," "look how they tortured me," and he showed his wrists bruised by the handcuffs.

A large crowd gathered; the Carabineros were paralyzed, they did not ask for any identification, it was very difficult to put him in the car, as he resisted, and only with the help of some detectives who passed by in a patrol car was he put into the light blue Fiat 125 vehicle, with license plates from the institution's Directorate of Intelligence, all of which were registered in the name of the Legal Representative of Director General Ruiz.

We returned with him to the "la Firma" facility, where the bosses beat him severely in a cell, even though he was wounded, with a fractured arm, a broken head, and bleeding from his mouth. The bosses told him: "You put the noose around your own neck." After this, he was left alone, abandoned, and without medical attention.

José, upon seeing this, was very depressed for a long time, as he felt guilty; that day I went on leave, leaving a guard team; when I entered the next day, they told me that in the afternoon they had taken him to a place in the Cuesta Barriga that I knew.

To finish, I will explain how I knew that place.

About ten days after this occurred—the matter of Contreras Maluje—I was sent with a sailor in a Renoleta to dig a large pit in a place I did not know. We went up the Cuesta Barriga for a stretch and went on foot into a small ravine, about 70 meters or more; there, with two Navy agents, "el Alex" and "el Chico," we spent about three hours digging a pit for two people.

That day I was able to realize that there were other corpses hidden there, as I accidentally stood on a grave and a sailor pointed it out to me; I believe there were at least 6 corpses.

The next day, I returned to the place in a Renoleta with several agents who were also in another vehicle. We brought 2 detainees; they were blindfolded, and I only remember one, whom I had to help climb up the ravine.

They walked semi-unconscious because they were being drugged. The one I remember had told me he was a teacher; he was tall, thin, with light eyes, almost blond hair, and was wearing a parka or a windbreaker.

It was very difficult for me to help him up. He realized they were going to kill him, as he told me in a low voice that he had not done anything wrong. I have no memory of the other detainee. When they were already at the place of martyrdom, (NN) sent me down toward the road to see that no other vehicles or people who might be hunting entered through the path; while I was down below, I could hear how (NN) mocked them while firing bursts at them with a silencer (the sound is dry and short).

Afterward, they came down with (NN) and (NN), who was a sadistic type, still mocking them.

I am sure that there are more corpses in that place than I am aware of, and I also cannot guarantee that when it was said that a person was being released, that was actually the case.

When the Contreras Maluje scandal occurred, there was an order from the high command to withdraw us immediately to the institution, and we returned to performing institutional work. [5]

For now, this is what I can declare regarding the case of the forcibly disappeared. We did not act directly in subversion again until much later, and only as support for the C.N.I. (for example, in the more or less unreal confrontations of Fuente Ovejuna and Janequeo in the year 83).

Having been read by the declarant, he ratifies it by signing.

Santiago, August 28, 1984.

NOTES

[1] For reasons of prudence and respect, Mensaje reserves the names of the other agents involved, detailed in the statement before the justice system (Editor's Note). [2] The following notes are taken verbatim from a second and long sworn statement that the same former agent made before the Vicaría de la Solidaridad, to expand and complete his previous account.

Among the detainees I remember there were at AGA, I can mention former Captain Ferrada and Corporal Figueroa, both from the FACH; Victor Toro, "el Reta," "el Pelao" Moreno, "el loco Mario," who tried to commit suicide there, Villavela, one they called "el Kila" (former Quilapayún); the deputy or senator Montes with his wife and two daughters.

Mr. Montes was always in the second-floor hallway of the AGA. The second floor of the Academy had two or three large rooms, which were conditioned as apartments. In those apartments, there were some prisoners who were somewhat trusted by the leadership. [3] "Among the jobs I remember having performed, such as providing protection for raids, is the one carried out at a kindergarten in the Plaza Egaña sector, where we discovered a MIR photographic laboratory.

I also remember the one in La Reina Alta, for the Peñalolén sector, with some MIR members. Later I learned that this had been a simulation to protect an informant for the organization, who lived in the AGA and whom they called "Barba" or Mr.

Velasco. I must add that some time later, and while I was his guard, he was kidnapped by the DINA when we were walking along Alameda a few meters from Nataniel street, exactly where the Metro exit, Moneda station, is now.

There, some DINA agents boxed us in and took him away. I also remember that I had to operate on Avenida Kennedy, where we were going to detain "coño Molina" from the MIR; on that occasion, the MIR member realized our trap and escaped, followed by one of our vehicles.

He was reached at a red light and was riddled with bullets there by (NN) when Molina tried to pull a weapon to defend himself; the MIR member died almost instantly. When we were trying to handle this situation, a red Peugeot appeared that did not want to obey our order to stop, and by swerving the car toward one of our agents, it fled, being followed by a C-10 pickup truck where I was traveling along with two agents and an officer.

The fugitive took Kennedy toward the center and we opened fire on the vehicle approximately two blocks before reaching the underpass at the end of the Club de Golf; since we blew out a tire, that car crashed into a pole and overturned, and one of the impacts also hit the subject in the back, causing his death.

Upon checking his belongings, we realized that he was an Army lieutenant and that the car had belonged to General Pinochet's son. We learned later that from that moment on, the officer suffered from persecution mania and had made the maneuver against us for that reason." [4] "I also wish to add that both in the places called Nido 20 and Nido 18, as well as in the place in Colina to which I referred in the previous statement, I went with some regularity whenever a doctor called (NN) "son" was required, who today is a cardiologist at the FACH hospital and at that time was an intern.

This doctor treated a person we detained in '76 named Guerrero, who was wounded by chance at the moment of detaining him by an agent who was a sailor and was taken to the Carabineros hospital to recover. (...) The doctor I also mentioned put a cast on "old Fuentes Rodríguez" when, while trying to commit suicide, he broke his arm at Nido 18.

He also treated him medically by giving pills to Quila Leo, since he had an ulcer. He also gave injections to the detainees when they were being drugged." [5] "However, last year (1983), after the death of Carol Urzúa occurred and about two days before September 7, we learned through (NN) that the C.N.I. was asking our group to support it in capturing, on a day they would indicate to us, the subversive group that had killed Carol Urzúa.

In the morning, they gathered a small group of us and we arrived in a pickup truck at Borgoño, a place where the C.N.I. has a facility. Only (NN) got out to speak with the C.N.I. officers, and we had a long wait of hours inside the pickup truck, which was located in the courtyard of that facility.

Shortly after noon, we were told to position ourselves in the Plaza Egaña sector, and we left for there. By radio, since we were connected on the same frequency, we began to hear some isolated information about what was happening.

While detained in the Borgoño courtyard, we heard that they had begun to follow No. 1 (who was Palma) and whom we later learned they intercepted on Avda. Kennedy in a car. We also learned that they detained another of the group of three who are in the War Council at a bus stop, and that near where the detention center known as Capuchinos is located, they detained the third.

When it had already gotten dark, we were signaled by radio to move toward the Arrieta street sector, east of the Américo Vespucio beltway before reaching an electrical substation, because we were told that we had to wait for orders there to liquidate a target; this meant killing a person who lived in that sector; I even remember that we made a mistake, since we stopped in a passageway whose name I do not remember, and they scolded us, telling us to move because we were precisely in front of our target's house and the rest of the forces had not yet arrived and the conditions of the place were being evaluated. Ultimately, they decided not to proceed at that house, since there were many people in the neighboring houses (I believe there was a party) and the operation could have a too-high cost in lives. Then we were ordered to go toward Avda. Colón, where there is a supermarket on the south-east corner, in relation to a roundabout where Tomás Moro street also ends. We were there for a while, while instructions were given to act on a house on Fuente Ovejuna street, where it had been detected that there were three people. A C.N.I. Jeep arrived at that parking lot (they have two of that type), which has a sunroof and on which a .50 caliber machine gun is installed, on a hydraulic system that allows it to be raised above the roof level and operated by two men, one who fires and another who passes the ammunition belt. After a moment, we all headed in front of the Fuente Ovejuna house. Exactly in front of the front part, there was a passageway and the Jeep was installed there; I remember that I stayed behind a pole and, ultimately, all the rest of the personnel had the house completely surrounded. The officer in command was asked: "Is the fire base ready?", and, upon the affirmative response, the order to fire was given, the Jeep's roof was activated, the machine gun came out, and it began to fire for a space of a minute, I believe. I must place on record that that weapon fires 1,000 rounds per minute. Once this operation, in which only the fire base participated, was finished, silence returned and through a loudspeaker, the people inside were asked to surrender. From the house, it was said "we are going to surrender." Then one of the residents came out, with his hands held high, placed on the back of his neck; I remember he was fair-skinned and thin. When he approached the front garden gate, 2 C.N.I. agents stepped forward and riddled him with bullets from almost a meter away; bending forward, he fell to the ground. At that instant, the woman, from inside, fired a burst outward. This provoked a new order to fire, which we all did, together with the fire base. I do not know how long that lasted, but obviously, it must not have been more than three or four minutes. It was at this moment that a flare was thrown inside the house, which caused the fire. It was my turn to drag toward the street, subsequently, the first one who died and the woman afterward. We entered the house and in the hallway, the woman was lying, whom I also helped to drag toward the street, and in another place that I do not remember, was (NN). About five minutes later, the Homicide Brigade approached to take charge of the legal part. We received the order to head toward the western sector of the city to Janequeo street, which was near Plaza Garín, which we had a hard time locating. When we were already near our target, they told us to crouch down because one of the people who was to be eliminated was running and passed by the side of our pickup truck. When he reached a sector where there is a wall, he was riddled with bullets by some C.N.I. agents, and immediately the fire base, which was also at the scene, began to fire on a house along with other agents. Now details of this action come to my memory. It was said that one of the C.N.I. agents had been wounded. The truth is that he was not wounded by "José," but rather he tried to put a "Cardoen" grenade through the window. For that, he ran across the side of a window and threw it, with such bad luck that the grenade bounced off the window bars and returned to the sidewalk. It exploded and the shrapnel wounded his buttocks and the back of his legs. Nothing happened to his chest because he was wearing a bulletproof vest. I also remember that as soon as the one who was running down the street fell murdered, a C.N.I. agent who had a gloved hand approached, passed a weapon through his hand, and left it lying near him, but he was unarmed. I was very impressed that time by the speed the C.N.I. had in that detail, to cover themselves for that death. In a minute, calm was restored, we entered the house, and in the backyard, we found "José" dead. The people in the neighborhood were shouting at us that there was a child there, whom at first we thought was lying on a bed, but it was a bloodstained pillow. Later we learned that the child had jumped through the yard and had ended up at a lady's house, but we did not worry about him anymore. After these events occurred, we returned to the Ce

Operations Center on Borgoño and there we were released, heading toward our office and the base. I want to expressly clarify that the intention and the order in both events that I have recounted was simply to liquidate the occupants, since it was already known that the direct authors of the death of Carol Urzúa were detained and could be shown to the press.

Source: Revista Mensaje No. 336, January-February 1985

In a unanimous ruling, the highest court rejected the appeal for cassation filed against the sentence that convicted, among others, two agents who were part of the so-called Comando Conjunto, for their responsibility in the consummated crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Carlos Enrique Sánchez Cornejo, José Arturo Weibel Navarrete, and Mariano León Turiel Palomera.

The Supreme Court rejected the appeal for cassation filed against the sentence that convicted, among others, two agents who were part of the so-called Comando Conjunto, for their responsibility in the consummated crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Carlos Enrique Sánchez Cornejo, José Arturo Weibel Navarrete, and Mariano León Turiel Palomera.

These illicit acts were perpetrated on different dates between December 1975 and July 1976 in the Metropolitan Region. In a unanimous ruling (case file 18.762-2019), the Second Chamber of the highest court—composed of ministers Haroldo Brito, Jorge Dahm, minister María Teresa Letelier, minister Diego Simpértigue, and lawyer (i) Pía Tavolari—confirmed the sentence that convicted Daniel Luis Enrique Guimpert Corvalán to a single sentence of 12 years of effective imprisonment as the author of the consummated crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Sánchez Cornejo, perpetrated on December 17, 1975; Weibel Navarrete (March 29, 1976); and Turiel Palomera (July 15, 1976). Meanwhile, Carlos Hernán Rodrigo Villarreal must serve 5 years and one day of imprisonment as a co-author of the aggravated kidnapping of Weibel Navarrete. In the sentence, the highest court dismissed the claim of legal error in the challenged judgment, issued by the Santiago Court of Appeals, which refused to apply the partial statute of limitations to the former agents convicted as authors of crimes against humanity.

Comando Conjunto

In the first-instance ruling, visiting judge Miguel Vázquez Plaza established the following facts: "a) That there existed a military intelligence group, hierarchical and disciplined, called Comando Conjunto that operated between the years 1975 and 1976, formed by agents belonging to the Air Force Intelligence Directorate (DIFA), Carabineros (DICAR), Navy (SIN), and Army (DINE), plus civilians, whose main objective was the repression of the Communist Youth and the Communist Party, for which they proceeded to detain persons linked to said party, who were deprived of liberty to obtain information through physical and psychological torture, and subsequently released, transferred to an unknown destination, or killed; b) that, for operational repression, the so-called Comando Conjunto used secret detention centers, such as the Casa de Apoquindo, the Hangar at the Cerrillos Airport, and others that had been seized from militants of persecuted political parties, such as those called Nido 18 and Nido 20, all of which constituted clandestine detention centers; later, the La Prevención prison entered the scene, built inside the Colina Air Artillery Regiment, better known as ‘Remo Cero,’ operating approximately from August 1975 until the first months of 1976, and finally the property on Calle Dieciocho, assigned to Carabineros, which corresponded to the place where the former newspaper El Clarín operated, being called La Firma until the end of 1976, facilities where prisoners were kept blindfolded and were interrogated under illegitimate duress. c) That, on 12/17/1975, Carlos Sánchez Cornejo, a militant of the Communist Party, left his home located in this city, Población Huemul No. 2, in the afternoon to buy the evening newspaper, being detained by agents of the Comando Conjunto, taken to Remo Cero, a place where he was seen by other detainees and from where his trail is lost. d) That, on 03/29/1976, while José Weibel Navarrete was traveling on bus 9046 of the Américo Vespucio route, license plate SL-45, in the company of his spouse and 2 minor children, agents of the so-called Comando Conjunto intercepted and boarded said bus, and taking advantage of a commotion due to an alleged robbery, they forced him off, putting him into a vehicle that transported him to the La Firma detention center; he was also kept in the FACH conscripts' bachelor house, agents of the Comando Conjunto, at Bellavista No. 125, from where he was taken by the heads of the operational groups, his final destination remaining unknown. e) That, on the afternoon of 10/30/1975, around 18:30, the member of the Communist Party of Chile, Francisco Hernán Ortiz Valladares, was detained in his furniture workshop located inside his home on Calle Romero No. 3016, by two individuals in civilian clothes, who took him out of the area in a car driven by a third individual. (SIC) Around 23:30 that same day, about eight individuals in civilian clothes, carrying submachine guns, entered the home of Raúl Armando Castro Vega, jumping over the exterior fence of the property, holding Ortiz Valladares detained and handcuffed, a place where in the month of September of that same year he had built a closet; one of the subjects stated that they were looking for a false bottom in the closet where weapons or documents might be hidden; finding nothing, they left the place in four cars, and since that date he has been forcibly disappeared, his whereabouts unknown. f) That, in the early hours of 10/31/1975, between 3:00 and 4:00, the member of the Communist Party José Santos Rocha Álvarez, known and politically related to Ortiz Valladares, was detained at his home in Puerto Aysén, site 155, Población Las Casas, Barrancas commune, by people in civilian clothes who were moving in 3 vehicles, and in that place firearms were found; both detainees were taken to an unknown destination, with Ortiz Valladares being seen subsequently in Remo Cero, a place where he was interrogated and tortured and a political investigation file was prepared for him by agents of said command, dated 11/04/1975, and for Rocha Álvarez, the same type of file was prepared on 11/02/1975, the final destination of both remaining unknown. g) That, on 07/15/1976, at 8:00, the member of the Communist Youth of Chile, Mariano León Turiel Palomera, left his home together with his wife, she to go to her work and he to carry out different errands. That day he picked up clothes from a dry cleaner on Calle Merced, between Ahumada and Bandera, and also money for a housing subsidy at the Banco Estado, located at Bandera and San Pablo, from where his trail is lost. Subsequent to the disappearance of Turiel Palomera, an anonymous letter was sent to the courts whose author states that the Communist Youth militant Mariano León Turiel Palomera was detained near the Estación Mapocho by the so-called Comando Conjunto, that the material apprehenders were the team of agents of the Chilean Navy belonging to said command, which fully coincides with the place where the trail of Mariano León Turiel Palomera is lost that day 07/15/1976.” In the civil aspect, the sentence was maintained, not appealed, which ordered the state to pay a total compensation of $1,520,000,000 (one billion five hundred twenty million pesos) to the victims' relatives.

Source: pjud.cl, July 20, 2022

Date: 07-20-2022

Santiago Court sentences 27 former Comando Conjunto agents for crimes against communist militants in 1975 and 1976

The Santiago Court of Appeals sentenced 27 agents of the so-called Comando Conjunto for their responsibility in the crimes of simple kidnapping and aggravated homicide of Ignacio Orlando González Espinoza and Juan René Orellana Catalán; and in the aggravated kidnappings of Ricardo Manuel Weibel Navarrete, Luis Desiderio Moraga Cruz, and Luis Emilio Gerardo Maturana García.

These illicit acts were perpetrated between November 1975 and June 1976 in Santiago. In a unanimous ruling (case file 1.237-2020), the Fifth Chamber of the appellate court—composed of ministers Fernando Carreño Ortega, Ricardo Soto Muñoz, and minister Lidia Poza Matus—confirmed the sentence issued by the extraordinary visiting judge Miguel Vásquez Plaza in October 2019, which sentenced the former FACH officer Juan Francisco Saavedra Loyola and the former Carabineros officer Manuel Agustín Muñoz Gamboa to 18 years of imprisonment as co-authors of the crimes of aggravated homicide of González Espinoza and Orellana Catalán; plus 13 years of imprisonment as co-authors of the aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz, Weibel Navarrete, and Maturana González; and plus 3 years of imprisonment each as co-authors of the crimes of simple kidnapping of González Espinoza and Orellana Catalán. Meanwhile, the former Navy officer Daniel Luis Enrique Guimpert Corvalán was sentenced to 18 years of imprisonment as co-author of the aggravated homicide of González Espinoza and Orellana Catalán; plus 12 years of imprisonment as co-author of the crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz and Maturana González; and 3 years of imprisonment as co-author of the crimes of simple kidnapping of González Espinoza and Orellana Catalán. Likewise, the Fifth Chamber ratified the sentences that must be served by: former Navy officer Jorge Aníbal Osses Novoa, and former Army officers Sergio Antonio Díaz López and Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, to 12 years of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of aggravated homicide of González Espinoza; plus 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-authors of the crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz and Weibel Navarrete, and 400 days of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of kidnapping of González Espinoza. Meanwhile, former agents Roberto Alfonso Flores Cisterna and Carlos Hernán Rodrigo Villarreal must serve 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of aggravated homicide of Orellana Catalán; plus 5 years and one day of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González, and 400 days of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agent Raúl Horacio González Fernández must serve two sentences of 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of aggravated homicide of Orellana Catalán and of the aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz and Maturana González; plus 400 days of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of simple kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agent Alejandro Segundo Sáez Mardones must serve two sentences of 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of aggravated homicide of Orellana Catalán and co-author of the aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González, plus 400 days of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. For his part, the former civilian agent of the SIFA, Otto Silvio Trujillo Miranda, was sentenced to 10 years and one day of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Weibel Navarrete and as an accomplice to the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz. Former agent Lenin Figueroa Sánchez was sentenced to 5 years and one day of imprisonment as an accomplice to the crime of aggravated homicide of Orellana Catalán; plus 5 years and one day of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González and 400 days as co-author of the crime of kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agents Sergio Daniel Valenzuela Morales and Juan Atilio Aravena Hurtuvia must serve 5 years of imprisonment as accessories to the crime of aggravated homicide of Orellana Catalán; plus 5 years and one day as co-authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González and 400 days of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agent Ernesto Arturo Lobos Gálvez must serve 5 years and one day of imprisonment as an accomplice to the crimes of kidnapping of Weibel Navarrete and Maturana González, and 60 days of prison as an accomplice to the crime of simple kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agent Alejandro Jorge Forero Álvarez must serve 5 years and one day of imprisonment as an accomplice to the crimes of aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz and Weibel Navarrete; 60 days of prison as an accomplice to the crime of simple kidnapping of González Espinoza. In addition, former civilian agents Viviana Lucinda Ugarte Sandoval, Andrés Pablo Potin Lailhacar, and Emilio Mahias del Río, together with former agents Juan Luis Fernando López López, José Evaristo Rojas Alruiz, and Francisco Segundo Illanes Miranda, must serve 5 years and one day of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González; 400 days of imprisonment as co-authors of the crime of simple kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Former agent Roberto Francisco Serón Cárdenas was sentenced to 5 years and one day of imprisonment as co-author of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Moraga Cruz. Finally, former agents Robinson Alfonso Suazo Jaque, Pedro Ernesto Caamaño Medina, Pedro Juan Zambrano Uribe, and José Hernando Alvarado Alvarado were sentenced to 4 years of imprisonment as accomplices to the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Maturana González; and 60 days of prison as accomplices to the crime of simple kidnapping of Orellana Catalán. Those also convicted in the first-instance ruling by the investigating judge Miguel Vásquez Plaza, former FACH officer Antonio Benedicto Quiroz Reyes and the reconverted civilian agent Miguel Arturo Estay Reyno, passed away in the time elapsed between that ruling and this one. Regarding the substance of the Court's resolution, the Fifth Chamber notes: «That this Court agrees then with the assessment of the sentencing judge and the Judicial Prosecutor, for the reasons expressed in the ruling and what was previously stated, that the facts, held as certain in the appealed sentence, are punishable by virtue of the predominance of International Human Rights Law over the prescriptions of internal or national law. This recognition is of vital importance because it grants crimes against humanity the relevance they deserve, since their perpetration affects all of humanity, the legal interests concerning international peace, security, and well-being, which International Criminal Law seeks to protect,» the confirming ruling states. In the judicial investigation, Judge Vásquez Plaza established that: a) That there existed a de facto group that operated clandestinely between the years 1975 and 1976, formed mainly by agents who belonged to the Air Force Intelligence Directorate, in addition to Carabineros de Chile, Navy, and Army, with the collaboration of civilians, whose main objective was the repression of the Communist Party Youth, for which they proceeded to detain several of them. b) That the aforementioned group used for detentions and torture: Hangar de Cerrillos; Nido 20, a secret detention and torture center located at Calle Santa Teresa No. 037, stop 20 of Gran Avenida; Nido 18, a secret center located at Calle Perú No. 9053, La Florida, Santiago, which was used exclusively for torture; La Prevención or Remo Cero, which were dungeons located inside the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, all this during the year 1975; La Firma, at the beginning of the year 1976, said group moved its operations to the back of the property in charge of Carabineros de Chile, located on Calle Dieciocho, opposite No. 229, which belonged to the former newspaper Clarín, being called La Firma. c) That the operational action of the group, regarding the persons illegitimately deprived of their liberty, keeping them in secret centers, was to obtain information from them under psychological and physical torture, achieving the collaboration of some of them, to the point that some were assimilated as operational agents of the group, which provided greater effectiveness in the chain detention of communist militants, who were forcibly disappeared, with it occurring that for some of them, in the course of the years, part of their remains were found. d) That on November 7, 1975, at approximately 22:00, Ricardo Manuel Weibel Navarrete was detained at his home at Río Maule No. 1893, Recoleta Commune, by subjects wearing civilian clothes; he was kept deprived of liberty in the center called La Prevención or Remo Cero, located inside the Anti-Aircraft Regiment in Colina, the last place where he was seen alive and, subsequently, his bones were found on the grounds of Fuerte Arteaga, Peldehue. e) On June 8, 1976, in the Estación Central sector, Juan René Orellana Catalán met with Luis Emilio Gerardo Maturana González, both militants of the Communist Youth in hiding due to the political persecution they were subjected to, with the purpose of receiving money from the party from the hands of Maturana González, the latter in charge of distributing it; at that moment he was detained by agents of the group referred to in letter a), being kept recluse in the center called La Firma, and subsequently he was executed at Cuesta Barriga, where remains of his person were found consisting of dental pieces and a removable prosthesis. f) That, on October 20, 1975, in the early hours of the morning, Luis Desiderio Moraga Cruz was detained at his home at Pasaje Tokio No. 5862, Población Juanita Aguirre, Conchalí commune, Santiago, by subjects wearing civilian clothes; he was kept recluse in the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, inside which was the center called La Prevención or Remo Cero, where he gave the statement that appears on page 5532, this being the last place where he was seen alive. g) That, on December 4, 1975, in the early hours of the morning, Ignacio Orlando González Espinoza was detained at his home at Calle Soberanía No. 1220, Santiago, by subjects wearing civilian clothes; he was kept deprived of liberty in the center called La Prevención or Remo Cero, located inside the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment in Colina, the last place where he was seen alive and, subsequently, he was executed on the grounds of Fuerte Arteaga, Peldehue, where his bones were found. h) On June 8, 1976, in the Estación Central sector, Luis Emilio Gerardo Maturana González met with Juan René Orellana Catalán, both militants of the Communist Youth in hiding due to the political persecution they were subjected to, with the purpose of giving party money to Orellana Catalán for himself and so that he in turn would give it to other party militants since Maturana González was in charge of distributing it; at that moment he was detained by operational agents of the group described in letter a), being kept recluse in the center called La Firma, from where his trail is lost.

Source: resumenlatinoamerica.org, April 12, 2022

Date: 04-12-2022

The artists forcibly disappeared and executed by the civil-military dictatorship

During the civil-military dictatorship, at least a hundred people linked to culture, the arts, and heritage were executed and forcibly disappeared. On September 11, the most painful stage we have lived through began, caused by State agents and complicit civilians.

Today we commemorate 48 years of that tragedy that still mourns all of Chile. More than three thousand people, men, women, boys, girls, and young people such as primary, secondary, and university students; pregnant women, elderly people, the visually impaired, and the disabled were directly affected, and hundreds of thousands became family members and victims of the dictatorship.

Those who survive fight tirelessly for justice, reparation, and non-repetition of genocidal acts by the State. Men and women whose contribution to society came from their social struggle, as militants, and also from their trades and occupations as shoemakers, laborers, textile workers, doctors, linotypists, dressmakers, secretaries, union and neighborhood leaders, municipal officials, public employees, railway employees, newspaper sellers, carpenters; peasant laborers, miners, forestry workers, construction workers; engineers.

Also those who were passing through, on a mission, studying, or had formed a family in Chile coming from Vietnam, France, Spain, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay, England, Ecuador, Uruguay, among other countries.

Some of their murderers and accomplices who pay lukewarm sentences in luxury prisons have deprived us of them, but they have also deprived us of nearly a hundred artists and creators that we have identified, with the desire to offer a tribute to those who, from culture, the arts, and heritage, were victims of state terrorism.

We have recognized 82 people whose creativity was expressed in audiovisuals, crafts, theater, architecture, photography, Visual Arts, literature, and music. (excerpt)

Source: prensaopal.cl, September 8, 2021

Date: 09-08-2021

Freedom of the press under fire: Information as a public good for sustainable development (EXCERPT)

A few days ago, fellow journalist Mauricio Weibel Barahona, a dear Chilean friend, a brother of the heart and life that I discovered on the other side of the Andes Mountains that unites us, denounced the persecution, espionage, and intimidation to which the Chilean State has subjected him and his family for many years, before the Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression (RELE) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), Pedro Vaca.

Before doing so, he brought the same human rights violations with which he is still victimized these days to the attention of the successive presidents of the Supreme Court of Justice of Chile, magistrates Haroldo Brito and Guillermo Silva; the current national prosecutor of that country, Jorge Abbott; and the person who preceded Vaca in the Inter-American rapporteurship, Edison Lanza, without the attacks ceasing.

ESPIONAGE OPERATIONS

Mauricio, president and founder of the South American Union of Correspondents (UNAC), academic, investigative journalist, trainer, and educator of journalists, began to be harassed with espionage operations, surveillance, and anonymous telephone intimidation when he was writing the first of his best-selling books, “Asociación Ilícita,” in which he made known the “secret archives” of the dictatorship commanded by Augusto Pinochet Ugarte.

It was the year 2012. Since then, the persecution has not ceased. Despite this, Mauricio's investigations, turned into books, have not ceased either. “Traición a la Patria,” in 2016; “Los niños de la rebelión,” 2017; “Ni orden ni Patria,” 2018; the “Unesco Investigative Journalism Manual,” 2019; “La caída de las AFP,” 2020, are the most prominent of his works.

However, it was “Milicogate,” a succession of repeated acts of corruption committed by high-ranking officers of the Chilean army under the umbrella of what is known as the Reserved Copper Law to finance military purchases, which Mauricio investigated tirelessly and published with his byline in the newspaper The Clinic, that unleashed the wrath of the uniformed criminals.

Those revelations were the documentary basis that enabled the judicial prosecutions and convictions of nearly 850 active and retired military personnel. Among them, four commanders-in-chief of the army force.

The data on illicit acts collected, besides being incredible, are repugnant. A corporal, one of the lowest ranks in the military hierarchy, bet 2.5 billion pesos in a casino. The judicial intervention—based on that journalistic investigation—allowed the Chilean state to recover 4.5 billion dollars.

INFORMATION, A PUBLIC GOOD

Information—a public good—always and everywhere where a Democratic State of Law is developed also protects public goods. Mauricio's family home was broken into on three occasions. The newsroom and offices of The Clinic, as well.

From this last incursion, the security cameras installed in that media outlet recorded the events and the faces of the criminals. Those incriminating elements were provided to the Justice system. Nothing happened.

Two presidents—Michelle Bachelet and Sebastián Piñera—exercised the popular vicariate while the events related against freedom of the press, violating the human rights of journalists, were occurring. They only had empty words for the victims of such crimes.

Nothing known and effective was done to stop the aggressions that, in addition to Mauricio, reached colleagues Juan Cristóbal Peña and Javier Rebolledo, who were also investigating. They all had their computers, external hard drives, and flash drives stolen.

The New York Times correspondent in Chile, Pascale Bonnefoy, who was investigating human rights issues, was also victimized. The confidential journalistic sources who provided valuable data were and are harassed by military spies who resort to any resource to commit crimes against journalists and communicators who reveal their misdeeds.

One of those operations—illegal wiretaps that they justified with lies before venal judges—was commanded by General Humberto Oviedo. The Justice system, pressured by the social repercussions of the events made public by the journalistic investigations, will have little work to incriminate him and an enormous task, in the event that it wants and can look the other way.

Judges are also spied on. Among them, Romy Rutherford, investigator of military corruption. The military complains publicly. As incredible as it is undemocratic. Democracy is not on the right track in Chile.

The constitutional reform in the making brings hope. Respectable colleagues tell me that “President Piñera sent to Congress a bill that expands the powers of the armed forces over the civilian population, including human rights defenders and journalists.” Worrying.

It should not be approved. “Without vigorous investigative journalism, every society can become a dictatorship of money and oblivion,” maintains Mauricio. I adopt the concept. I make it mine. From this moment on, it will be another of my banners.

Weibel Barahona and I often talk long and hard. His family history—which is similar to that of many Latin Americans—is dramatic. The word impunity is part of his psychophysical and emotional development.

José Arturo Weibel Navarrete, “El Checho,” his father, was detained and forcibly disappeared on March 29, 1976, when he and his wife, María Teresa Barahona Muñoz, were taking the children to school. Thirty perpetrators “dressed as civilians took away who was our father, husband, brother, and friend.

We never saw him again,” Mauricio told me one afternoon at the Museum of Memory in Santiago, Chile. That day I could see his tears while his eyes were fixed on an old photo in which he is with El Checho. I cried with him. The murderous perpetrators of that political leader of Chile, affiliated with the Communist Party, have confessed to that crime for four decades, but they were never convicted.

IMPUNITY, THAT BLACK CLOUD

The word impunity—like a black cloud loaded with negativity—dims the Chilean sky. Mauricio knows it and, precisely for that reason, wants to move it with more and more information. That public good to which everyone has the right to access to inform ourselves and to inform others.

Changes are always possible. I think about that this autumn Friday night, sheltered in the old rocking chair. The glass offers me a Pizarras Pinot Noir 2018, an excellent Chilean wine. Saturday, unstoppable, breaks in with a silence that resonates and favors reflection.

Thus I remembered that, in 1991, Namibia, for a few months, had a new Constitution. Its then 800,000 inhabitants were governed by Sam Nujoma, the first democratic president, elected on November 11, 1989. He would remain in office for three terms. The events were unfolding with unusual dynamics. (EXCERPT)

Source: lanacionpy.arcpublishing.com, April 25, 2021

Date: 04-25-2021

Former Comando Conjunto agents convicted for eight cases of forcibly disappeared persons

The extraordinary visiting judge for human rights violation cases of the Santiago Court of Appeals, Miguel Vázquez Plaza, issued a sentence against former members of the so-called Comando Conjunto for their responsibility in eight crimes of aggravated kidnapping.

These illicit acts were perpetrated in October 1975 and July 1976 in Santiago. In the resolution adopted this week (case file 120.133-C), Judge Vázquez issued a sentence against eight members of the so-called “Comando Conjunto” for their responsibility in the aggravated kidnappings of Carlos Enrique Sánchez Cornejo (59 years old), José Arturo Weibel Navarrete (33), Francisco Hernán Ortiz Valladares (45), José Santos Rocha Álvarez (43), and Mariano León Turiel Palomera (30), which occurred between October 1975 and July 1976.

In the ruling, Judge Vázquez Plaza convicted the former FACH general and head of the CC, Freddy Enrique Ruiz Bunger, the former FACH officer Juan Francisco Saavedra Loyola, alias "El Mono," and the former Carabineros officer Manuel Agustín Muñoz Gamboa, alias "Lolo," to effective sentences of 18 years of imprisonment.

Meanwhile, the former Navy officer Daniel Luis Enrique Guimpert Corvalán, alias "Chico Horacio," was sentenced to 12 years of imprisonment, and the former FACH officer Antonio Benedicto Quiroz Reyes must serve 6 years of imprisonment.

In the case of agents Roberto Alfonso Flores Cisternas, former FACH official, Alejandro Julio Segundo Sáez Mardones, former Carabineros official, and Juan Carlos Hernán Rodrigo Villarreal, former Navy official, the magistrate sentenced them to sentences of 5 years and one day of imprisonment.

In the investigation stage, the judge established the following facts: a) That there existed a military intelligence group, hierarchical and disciplined, called Comando Conjunto that operated between the years 1975 and 1976, formed by agents belonging to the Air Force Intelligence Directorate (DIFA), Carabineros (DICAR), Navy (SIN), and Army (DINE), plus civilians, whose main objective was the repression of the Communist Youth and the Communist Party, for which they proceeded to detain persons linked to said party, who were deprived of liberty to obtain information through physical and psychological torture, and subsequently released, transferred to an unknown destination, or killed; b) That, for operational repression, the so-called Comando Conjunto used secret detention centers, such as the Casa de Apoquindo, the Hangar at the Cerrillos Airport, and others that had been seized from militants of persecuted political parties, such as those called Nido 18 and Nido 20, all of which constituted clandestine detention centers; later, the La Prevención prison entered the scene, built inside the Colina Air Artillery Regiment, better known as “Remo Cero,” operating approximately from August 1975 until the first months of 1976, and finally the property on Calle Dieciocho, assigned to Carabineros, which corresponded to the place where the former newspaper El Clarín operated, being called La Firma until the end of 1976, facilities where prisoners were kept blindfolded and were interrogated under illegitimate duress; c) That, on December 17, 1975, Carlos Sánchez Cornejo, a militant of the Communist Party, left his home located in this city, Población Huemul No. 2, in the afternoon to buy the evening newspaper, being detained by agents of the Comando Conjunto, taken to the Remo Cero center, a place where he was seen by other detainees and from where his trail is lost; d) That, on March 29, 1976, while José Weibel Navarrete was traveling on bus 9046 of the Américo Vespucio route, license plate SL-45, in the company of his spouse and two minor children, agents of the so-called Comando Conjunto intercepted and boarded said bus, and taking advantage of a commotion due to an alleged robbery, they forced him off, putting him into a vehicle that transported him to the La Firma detention center; he was also kept in the FACH conscripts' bachelor house, agents of the Comando Conjunto, at Bellavista No. 125, from where he was taken by the heads of the operational groups, his final destination remaining unknown; e) That, on the afternoon of October 30, 1975, around 18:30, the member of the Communist Party of Chile, Francisco Hernán Ortiz Valladares, was detained in his furniture workshop located inside his home on Calle Romero No. 3016, by two individuals in civilian clothes, who took him out of the area in a car driven by a third individual; around 23:30 that same day, about eight individuals in civilian clothes, carrying submachine guns, entered the home of Raúl Armando Castro Vega, jumping over the exterior fence of the property, holding Ortiz Valladares detained and handcuffed, a place where in the month of September of that same year he had built a closet; one of the subjects stated that they were looking for a false bottom in the closet where weapons or documents might be hidden; finding nothing, they left the place in four cars, and since that date he has been forcibly disappeared, his whereabouts unknown; f) That, in the early hours of October 31, 1975, between 03:00 and 04:00, the member of the Communist Party José Santos Rocha Álvarez, known and politically related to Ortiz Valladares, was detained at his home in Puerto Aysén, site 155, Población Las Casas, Barrancas commune, by people in civilian clothes who were moving in three vehicles, and in that place firearms were found; both detainees were taken to an unknown destination, with Ortiz Valladares being seen subsequently in “Remo Cero,” a place where he was interrogated and tortured and a political investigation file was prepared for him by agents of said Command, dated November 4, 1975, and for Rocha Álvarez, the same type of file was prepared on November 2, 1975, the final destination of both remaining unknown, and g) That, on July 15, 1976, at 08:00, the member of the Communist Youth of Chile, Mariano León Turiel Palomera, left his home together with his wife, she to go to her work and he to carry out different errands. That day he picked up clothes from a dry cleaner on Calle Merced between Ahumada and Bandera and also money for a housing subsidy at the Banco Estado, located at Bandera and San Pablo, from where his trail is lost. Subsequent to the disappearance of Turiel Palomera, an anonymous letter was sent to the courts whose author states that the Communist Youth militant, Mariano León Turiel Palomera, was detained near the Estación Mapocho by the so-called Comando Conjunto, that the material apprehenders were the team of agents of the Chilean Navy belonging to said Command, which fully coincides with the place where the trail of Mariano León Turiel Palomera is lost that day July 15, 1976. Although the ruling is a first-instance one, it establishes a clear responsibility of the criminals and a firm condemnation of these crimes.

Source: resumen.cl, July 7, 2017

Date: 07-07-2017

Six former uniformed officers prosecuted for human rights case

The head of the Third Criminal Court of Santiago, Graciela Gómez, submitted six former uniformed officers to prosecution for their participation in the kidnapping of the former communist leader José Weibel and the detention of Carlos Sánchez Cornejo.

The prosecution affected former FACH members Enrique Ruiz Bunger, Juan Francisco Saavedra Loyola, Jorge Rodrigo Combos, and Daniel Luis Guimpert; former Carabineros officer Manuel Muñoz Gamboa; and the civilian César Luis Palma Ramírez. They were also prosecuted as authors, together with Alejandro Sáez Mardones, currently recluse in the Punta Peuco prison, for the kidnapping of José Weibel.

Source: La Nacion.cl, January 30, 2004

Date: 01-30-2004

Memory and Oral Archive: Sons and Daughters of Forcibly Disappeared Persons (BOOK)

Memory and Oral Archive: Sons and Daughters of Forcibly Disappeared Persons PIDEE, Protection of Childhood Damaged by States of Emergency. Project financed by the Embassy of Finland and in collaboration with the Museum of Memory and Human Rights. Maria Rosa Verdejo R Gloria Maureira L Maria Teresa Dalla Porta

Source: pidee.cl, 2014