The brothers Hernán Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, both married, agricultural workers, and union leaders, were detained on September 15, 1973, along with 4 other peasants, from the La Estrella settlement in the town of Huelquén, Paine.

The detention involved Carabineros from the Paine Sub-prefecture and armed civilians. No official documentation was presented to justify such an arrest. Subsequently, they were taken to the Sub-prefecture, where all those affected were kept together.

Starting at 9:30 PM that day, the other peasants were released, but this did not occur for the Albornoz Prado brothers, whose whereabouts remain unknown; to this day, they remain in the status of forcibly disappeared.

At approximately 3:00 PM on September 15, 1973, an operation began at the La Estrella settlement. Sergeant Manuel Reyes Alvarez, Carabineros Angel Cabello González, Guillermo Oscar Fuentes, and Sergio José Nilo Calderón, and Corporals Osvaldo Carrasco Jerez and Juan Enrique Zapata Flores arrived at the scene.

Along with them were civilians Julio Emilio Tagle Román, a farmer and owner of the San Miguel estate; Rubén Darío González Gallardo, owner of a butcher shop; and a merchant with the surname Ramírez, all of whom were residents of Paine. They immediately began detaining peasants whose names appeared on a list carried by the captors.

This is how Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, his father Juan Bernardo Albornoz Ramírez, his cousin Luis Enrique Albornoz Prado, and the peasants Isaías Lázaro Quintero Espinoza and Luis Antonio González Pinto were detained. Simultaneously, Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado was detained while arriving at his parents' home.

The detainees were transported to the Paine Sub-prefecture in private vehicles driven by the civilians. For this, they used a red Fiat, another white or cream-colored vehicle, a bluish one, and a truck.

Upon entering the Sub-prefecture, they were kept in the guardroom, where they were stripped of their personal belongings and forced to remove their clothes, remaining only in their underwear. There, their hair was also shaved off; they were then taken to a dungeon from which they were called out one by one to be subjected to interrogations accompanied by beatings and insults.

At approximately 9:30 PM that same day, Sergeant Raúl Reyes A. began ordering the release of the prisoners every 10 minutes. Those who were released had to return to their homes during curfew hours. Their homes were located in Huelquén, 12 km away from the sub-prefecture.

The Albornoz Prado brothers were not released.

The following day, their respective spouses requested information at the Sub-prefecture and were given contradictory answers. Some Carabineros said that the entire group had been released the previous night, while others replied that the detainees had been transferred to San Bernardo by a military patrol.

In case file 23853, initiated in the Maipo-Buin Court of Letters regarding the illegal arrest of the Albornoz Prado brothers, the four released peasants appeared to testify, confirming their arrests and their time spent as detainees at the Paine Sub-prefecture alongside the Albornoz Prado brothers.

Civilians Julio Emilio Tagle Román and Rubén Darío González Gallardo were also summoned to testify. Both denied knowing the Albornoz Prado family and denied having participated in any joint operation with the Carabineros. However, they acknowledged to the Court that they had provided their private vehicles to the Paine Carabineros after September 11, 1973.

In the same case, Sergeant Reyes was summoned to testify (June 4, 1975). He stated verbatim in one part: "many times we had to detain people who were specifically requested by the military, who gave us the names and addresses, and we only went to those places, detained them, and immediately handed them over to the military.

The names of the detainees were not recorded in any book, so no control was kept regarding this. Because of this, I cannot specify the destination of the brothers Hernán Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, whom I do not physically recognize, although I know their father.

If they were detained at the Sub-prefecture, they must have been taken by the Military from San Bernardo." Regarding the civilians, he declared: "Regarding the use of private vehicles and the fact that Carabineros were accompanied by civilians, I must say that at that time many civilians collaborated with the Carabineros by lending us their vehicles, and some drove their cars themselves; apart from that, they had no other participation in police duties."

In case file 26036-2, investigated in the same Court regarding the kidnapping of Ramón Alfredo Capetillo Mora, which occurred in Paine on October 8, 1973, Lieutenant Colonel Nelson Juan Bravo Espinoza testified.

When informing the Court of the procedure followed in the arrests of the detainees, he contradicted what had been stated by his subordinate, Sergeant M. Reyes. Thus, Nelson Bravo, referring to the detention of Ramón A.

Capetillo, said verbatim: "I must state to you that I know nothing personally, but in the event that this person had been detained for any reason in the Paine Sub-prefecture—which I do not know, as I do not personally recognize said person—it would have to be registered in the Unit's books, and if it does not appear there, it is impossible that he was detained in the Sub-prefecture," and added, "I want to clarify to you that we did not carry out operations to detain any specific person or persons, since the operations were always in charge of the Military, who, whether they took detainees or not, did not pass through the Sub-prefecture. In any case, I must state that we never acted together; it was always totally separate. Furthermore, the orders the Carabineros had were for surveillance, since patrolling and detentions were in charge of the Army." (July 4, 1980).

In the lawsuit for the illegal arrest of the Albornoz Prado brothers, file 25614-2 of the Maipo-Buin Court of Letters, the Carabineros accused of participating in said arrest were summoned to testify. Corporal Guillermo Oscar Fuentes Barrera testified on May 14, 1979, regarding Sergeant Reyes: "In Paine, Sergeant Reyes was the third-in-command, and his job was to watch the people, his work, his organization." Another person implicated in the events, Corporal Osvaldo Heriberto Carrasco Jerez, when asked by the Court, stated on October 19, 1979: "I effectively knew Juan Bernardo Albornoz Ramírez, who lived on the La Estrella estate in Huelquén, and likewise his two sons, Juan and Hernán, who were left-wing activist leaders, whom we had to watch on different occasions so that no damage or serious consequences would occur, as they were in charge of activating the people and taking over properties in the area; in any case, I do not remember seeing his father acting in such events."

It is necessary to indicate at this point that in the possession of the Court, at the time Corporal Carrasco testified, there was already an Official Letter sent by Colonel Fernando Arancibia Reyes, Vice Director of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), in which he reported regarding both brothers that, after reviewing the documentation of said Center, they did not have any record of political activity or militancy in political parties, nor were there any arrest warrants of any kind against them.

In the same case (file 25614), Alejandro Bustos González, a peasant from the area who survived his execution, was summoned to testify. On September 17, 1973, he had presented himself at the Paine Sub-prefecture after being informed by the President of the Paula Jaraquemada settlement (to which he belonged) that he was required at the police station.

For the same reason, the peasants Raúl del Carmen Lazo Quinteros, Orlando Enrique Pereira Cancino, Pedro Luis Ramírez Torres, and Carlos Chavez Reyes presented themselves on that occasion. Bustos González declared to the Court that he had recognized Sergeants Víctor Sagredo and Manuel Reyes and Carabineros with the surnames Valenzuela and Ortiz at the Sub-prefecture.

Upon entering the police station, he was stripped of his personal belongings and forced to undress, remaining only in his underwear. He was interrogated about alleged possession of weapons, and his negative answers were followed by punishments and death threats.

Subsequently, he was placed in a dungeon where he remained with other detainees, among them his 4 companions from the Paula Jaraquemada settlement. All had clear signs of having been severely punished.

These five peasants were taken out of the dungeon at 1:00 AM on September 18 and loaded into a private green van that began its journey accompanied by a small yellow vehicle owned by the Carrasco brothers, civilians from the area.

Joining the caravan were Francisco Luzoro, President of the Truckers' Union; Claudio Oregón, another local nicknamed "the lightning"; and other civilians whose names are unknown. All of them were truckers affiliated with SIPRODUCAM (Professional Union of Truck Owners).

Among the uniformed men, Bustos González clearly identified Sergeant Manuel Reyes. The vehicles headed to the Collipeumo estate, where the 5 peasants were ordered to get out of the vehicle. The moments lived subsequently, which ended the lives of four of them, were recounted by Bustos González to the Court in this way: "Sergeant Reyes told us: 'Because you won't agree, because you won't tell the truth, this is as far as you go, we are going to kill you,' and he made us stand next to the river.

Immediately after, the Carabineros discharged their weapons against us, as in an execution squad. I received a bullet impact in my left arm; at my side, I felt the other people fall; I do not remember who was immediately next to me; I fell on my back; Carlos Chávez fell on top of me, wounded.

Then the police and the civilians approached our bodies; I had blood on my face; the wound on my arm was bleeding a lot, and my left arm was practically bent toward my back. Between Sergeant Reyes and the civilian Carrasco, they grabbed me by the head and another by the feet, and exclaiming 'this one is ready,' they proceeded to throw me into the river waters.

I fell violently into the current; the water carried my body; as best I could, I grabbed onto some willow roots with my right hand. While there, in a whirlpool of the water, Orlando Pereira was floating, who was still alive.

He begged me to help him; I could not do so because I ran the risk of being dragged by the current. The current threw both of us to the riverbank; Pereira was still alive, presenting seven or eight bullet impacts in his chest; he was bleeding profusely. He perished a few minutes later, having asked before that I tell his wife to take care of themselves."

The lifeless bodies of these 4 peasants were recovered by their relatives after having been informed of their executions by Alejandro Bustos González. Their deaths were registered in the Civil Registry, and their bodies were buried in the Paine Cemetery in September 1973.

The names of Juan Humberto and Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado appeared in the report that the Chilean government delivered in 1975 to the United Nations at its 30th Session, the purpose of which was to account for the human rights situation in Chile.

Indeed, a list of 63 people "presumed forcibly disappeared" was annexed to said report, for whom the government declared there was evidence in the Legal Medical Institute that they were deceased persons.

Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado appeared with autopsy protocol No. 2551, date of death September 16, 1973, at 10:00 PM, while Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado appeared with protocol 2545, date of death September 15, 1973, at 1:30 PM.

It should be noted that in case 240051, whose investigation was in charge of the Extraordinary Visiting Minister Juan Rivas L. and in which the disappearance of 23 peasants from Paine was sought to be clarified, it was established that said list presented by the Military Government to the United Nations was false.

There were doubts about the authenticity of the signature consigned on it and attributed to Dr. Vargas, who at the time of the investigation was deceased. Likewise, it was established that the stamp that appeared on the report did not correspond to the one used by the Directorate of the Legal Medical Institute.

On the other hand, Visiting Minister Rivas, after studying the 63 autopsy protocols attributed to forcibly disappeared persons, had concluded that they corresponded to people who died from bullet impacts after September 11, 1973, and whose identity had not been possible to establish because the corpses lacked skin on their hands; for this reason, their remains had been registered as N.N. (John/Jane Doe) without subsequent identifications.

Thus, the existence of an official recognition of their death was ruled out, and their status as Forcibly Disappeared remained in both cases.

The detentions and subsequent disappearances of the Albornoz Prado brothers are framed within what was the repression in Paine in 1973.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

The first efforts to locate the whereabouts of the Albornoz Prado brothers were carried out by their relatives, who personally went to the detention centers in Paine, Buin, San Bernardo, and Santiago; they also held interviews with representatives of the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Defense.

In all of them, the results were negative. They did not obtain recognition of their arrests, nor could they establish what happened to them after their detentions. Faced with such results, both families initiated separate complaints before the Courts of Justice.

Sara Duarte, spouse of Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado, filed an Amparo appeal (habeas corpus) on behalf of her husband on December 4, 1974, before the Rancagua Court of Appeals (file 13363). Said Court sent an official letter to the Ministry of the Interior in order to gather information on any administrative order that might have been issued by that Ministry and that would affect the detainee.

In similar terms, it sent an official letter to the Ministry of National Defense and requested reports from the Paine Carabineros. All responses were negative. None of them had any record of an order affecting the person for whom the appeal was filed.

With this information, the Court resolved on December 9, 1974, to dismiss the Amparo appeal. Without prejudice to the above, it resolved to send an official letter to the Maipo-Buin Court of Letters so that the corresponding summary could be initiated and the veracity of what was stated by the complainant could be investigated, and if so, the identity of the "alleged officials who acted in these events, pursuing the corresponding responsibilities." Thus, case file 23853 was initiated, with the investigating judge ordering an official letter to be sent to the Legal Medical Institute so that it could report to the Court on the entry of the detainee's corpse starting from September 15, 1973. The response from this Institute was also negative. His name was not found registered in the indices of corpse entries or protocols performed between September 15, 1973, and December 27, 1974.

The Court also ordered the Investigative Police to investigate in order to try to find the whereabouts of Albornoz Prado. In its report, it stated that it had gone to the Paine Sub-prefecture, where it obtained from Captain Víctor Hugo Moya Rivera the information that the detention of Albornoz Prado did not appear in the detention books of the indicated date.

They had received a similar response when requesting information at the San Bernardo Infantry School.

Three months after the start of the process, the detainee's father, Mr. Juan Bernardo Albornoz Prado, filed a Criminal Complaint for the alleged crime of Illegal Deprivation of Liberty committed against his sons Hernán Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado. For the latter, his wife Olga Lizama Calderón had filed an Amparo appeal in which the Rancagua Court of Appeals had resolved "no grounds."

The complaint was consolidated with case 23853 on August 17, 1975.

The 4 peasants who had been arrested along with the Albornoz Prado brothers testified before the Investigating Judge, confirming the facts. For their part, the civilians implicated in the illegal arrest, as well as Sergeant Manuel Reyes, declared, denying any participation.

Despite the state of the case, the judge decided to close the summary and dismiss the process on June 25, 1975. This resolution was approved by the Rancagua Court of Appeals on July 30, 1975, ordering its filing.

On March 2, 1979, and with the situation of the detainees having not changed, a complaint for the kidnapping of the Albornoz Prado brothers was filed again before the same Court. The action was directed against the people who had participated in the kidnapping and who were identified.

Judge Fernando Montenegro A. was in charge of process file 25614-2. The investigation carried out by Judge Montenegro did not achieve progress.

The San Bernardo Infantry School, International Police, National Intelligence Center, Civil Registry Directorate, General Cemetery Directorate, and Legal Medical Institute responded negatively. The plaintiff requested that the process be consolidated with case 24005 because they were events of the same nature committed within the jurisdiction of the same Court, because the same people were implicated in most of the cases, and because these events had been carried out within the same short space of time.

Faced with such a request, and with case 240051 temporarily under consultation by another Court, its resolution was postponed indefinitely.

For its part, the Rancagua Prefecture of Investigations delivered reports regarding the investigations carried out by them around this process. In said report, along with reproducing the statements of the relatives of those affected, it was pointed out to the Court that there were numerous people who, after September 11, 1973, had made complaints of "Presumed Misfortune" (missing persons) regarding relatives who had been detained in operations by Carabineros and/or the Military, according to the statements of the complainants themselves, and that all of them were being investigated through simple decrees. By virtue of this, the Prefecture of Investigations requested from the Investigating Judge of the case a warrant that would grant it broad powers of investigation, search, breaking and entering, seizure of documents, and the apprehension of those who turned out to be responsible for the disappearance of these people. In addition, Investigations attached a list of cases under investigation in that same Court for presumed misfortunes, of whose people nothing was known to date (May 31, 1979), and in which, according to the statements of the complainants, Carabineros or Military personnel had participated. These were processes No. 23802 dated October 24, 1974; case 23847 dated December 13, 1974; case 24005 dated June 2, 1975; and case 25245-3 of April 25, 1978, all of which had been duly reported and returned without results to that court. The judge did not take any resolution regarding such information. The plaintiff also provided important information that demonstrated the joint participation of civilians and Carabineros in the crimes of kidnapping and homicide. The peasant Alejandro del C. Bustos González, who survived his execution, was presented to the Court. He provided the names of each of those implicated in the execution of 4 peasants on that occasion when he came out alive. Civilians Juan Francisco Luzoro Montenegro, head of the Truck Owners' Union in the Santiago Province, and Mario Emilio Tagle Román had to testify before the Court. Sergeant Reyes also had to testify for his participation in the events. Upon denying all participation and knowledge of the events, the plaintiff requested that they be confronted with the survivor Alejandro Bustos González. In the confrontations carried out in 1981, each one maintained their statements. In November 1981, the judge declared the summary closed and resolved to temporarily dismiss the case, "the perpetration of the crime that gave rise to the formation of the case not being completely justified in the records."

The cases of Hernán Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado are recorded in case 290E, which is being investigated by Visiting Minister Germán Hermosilla by resolution of the President Aguirre Cerda Court of Appeals, and in which a complaint for illegal burials that occurred in Paine in 1985 was accepted for processing.

At the close of this writing (late 1992), no new information regarding these two detainees had been produced in said case.

The information on the Albornoz Prado brothers is also included in case file 4449-AF, which is being investigated by the 22nd Criminal Court of Santiago and which was initiated on August 22, 1991, upon the filing of a complaint for the crimes of illegal burials of forcibly disappeared persons who currently remain buried as N.N. in Patio 29 of the General Cemetery of Santiago.

Both complaints were formulated by the Vicariate of Solidarity of the Archbishopric of Santiago.

In September 1991, the investigating judge ordered the exhumation of 125 bodies buried in 108 graves. At the close of this writing, the remains are at the Legal Medical Institute, and work is underway on their identification.

Source: Corporation report

El Mostrador publishes below an excerpt from a chapter of a book by journalists Javier Rebolledo and Nancy Guzmán, to be published in 2015, which will address the role of civilians who acted as "passive" and "non-passive" accomplices to the Pinochet dictatorship.

The individuals chosen range from lawyers, doctors, engineers, politicians, journalists, and operators to major businessmen. The investigation focuses on previously unpublished episodes, such as the participation in the repression by some members of the Kast family, owners of the Bavaria chain, in the Paine area, where there was a massive extermination of peasants who had benefited from the agrarian reform.

Pedro León Vargas Barrientos thought he had nothing to worry about on the morning of September 13, 1973. He was only 23 years old, a member of the MIR, and had worked at the Bavaria establishments a short time before.

On September 11, he presented himself at the Paine Sub-prefecture, and the captain in charge, Nelson Bravo, who knew him well, told him that “everything was in order. So he returned just as he had arrived”[1], recalls Sylvia Vargas, Pedro’s sister.

Despite this, on September 13, he was brutally pulled from the bread line and dragged to a vehicle that took him to the police station. Several neighbors tried to help him; some grabbed his clothes, but it was impossible.

Once in the dungeon, he commented to his cellmate, Armando Pereira Salas, that “his detention was ‘serious’”[2]. As the right arm of the Armed Forces and Carabineros, there were the civilians who walked triumphantly through the streets of the small town.

Christian Kast, son of the owner of the Bavaria establishments, was summoned to testify by the judiciary in 2003. The case was reopened in 2002 by the minister of the San Miguel Court of Appeals, María Stella Elgarrista, who consolidated them into a single case, named “Paine,” because 70 citizens from localities such as Pintué, El Escorial, Chada, Culitrín, and Hospital, among others, had been murdered or remained forcibly disappeared.

On that occasion, he acknowledged that: “We accompanied the Carabineros to the Aculeo sector to greet local farmers and to celebrate what had happened that day”[3]. That same September 11, he drove his family’s green Datsun 1500 to the Sub-prefecture, loaded with food from Bavaria for the Carabineros. “Because they had a communal pot there.

I was invited to stay at the location until the following day”[4], he declared. It was there that a large number of the forcibly disappeared from Paine were last seen.

A while later, during that same night, Kast saw a group of detainees arrive at the Sub-prefecture, “who were removed on the morning of the 12th by a military truck. They had their heads shaved”[5]. Kast never reported this fact to the justice system.

Christian Kast is the current President of the cold cuts factory, restaurants, and delicatessen Bavaria, a well-known food company that has branches throughout a significant part of Chile, and brother of the current deputy and vice president of the Independent Democratic Union (UDI), José Antonio Kast. He is also the uncle of Felipe Kast, deputy and leader of Evópoli.

At noon on September 12, hours after the detention of Pedro Vargas, “a barbecue was held at the indicated site (the courtyard of the Sub-prefecture) and I returned to my house, at which point my mother forbade me from continuing to go to the sub-prefecture because of everything that had happened and what she had seen on television.

Despite this, in the following days, I returned to the sub-prefecture to drop off cold cuts from our family business, the Bavaria establishments, on two or three occasions and in the afternoon. Each time I went, I saw Carabineros and civilians sharing barbecues in the courtyard I indicated.

On those occasions, I learned that there were detainees in the barracks, who were in some rooms located at the back of it. I only remember hearing about a person nicknamed ‘Harina Seca’ [Dry Flour]; I do not remember other names or nicknames.”[6]

When Minister Elgarrista summoned Michael Kast to testify as an accused in 2003, she was interested in knowing the ownership of the trucks that had participated in the transport of the forcibly disappeared prisoners of Paine.

She interrogated him as an accused. As of September 11, 1973, he was the owner of a red Mercedes Benz truck, fire-truck type. Both Kast and other interrogated civilians agreed judicially that the purpose of the loans was only for the transport of officials and their families to the Paine Sub-prefecture. “I do not remember if these trips were also made during the night; what I am sure of is that my vehicle was never left at the police station without the driver who worked for me.

Carlos, upon returning, would comment to me that they had indeed transported the families of the Paine officials.”

The detainee to whom Christian Kast refers, and for whom he never initiated any reporting procedure based on what he had heard at the Sub-prefecture, is Luis Nelson Cádiz Molina, a 28-year-old merchant, detained on September 14, a sympathizer of the MIR.

Cádiz is one of the forcibly disappeared of Paine. The last time he was seen alive was in the dungeon of the Paine Sub-prefecture, together with Pedro Vargas, both with signs of having been tortured.

Questioned by the judge, Christian Kast declared that he only knew Pedro as an employee of his establishment, but that he did not know about his situation. “Only subsequently did I become aware that he was detained by Carabineros, but I did not see him at the Sub-prefecture, nor did I hear that he was there when I went to said establishment.”[7]

According to the testimony of another detainee, Alejandro del Carmen Bustos González, around three in the morning on September 18, a Carabinero came to take roll call in the dungeon and took him out to the courtyard.

He ordered him to get dressed, left him there for a moment, and left toward the dungeon. Bustos observed several civilian vehicles parked, “always from the courtyard, and upon approaching a hallway, through a window, I was again able to observe the civilians.

I am referring to Francisco Luzoro, Claudio Oregón, Antonio Carrasco, Luis Mondaca, Segundo Suazo, Miguel González, Cristián Kast, Patricio Meza, Tito Carrasco, Mario Tagle, Jorge Nazar, and Ruperto Jara.”[8]

Minutes later, he, along with Carlos Chávez, Orlando Pereira, Luis Ramírez, and Raúl Lazo, were loaded by Carabineros into civilian vehicles. They were not hooded. The convoy took a road he recognized as the North-South highway.

Then they headed west, to a field. A winding dirt road, everyone in silence, and the hum of the engines. They were taken down, lined up in the middle of an open field, vehicle headlights illuminating them from the side, in front of them a platoon of civilians and Carabineros, and the horror of death in the making.

To his right, ten meters below, a black and foamy whirlpool of water, waiting for them to fall into it. “Raise your hands, Sergeant Reyes told us. We did it, and I looked up, toward the hill. ‘Damn, where are we, my God! My beautiful Virgin!’, I said to myself. And I see an image of the Virgin rising up on a cloud”[9], said Bustos with tears.

When the roar sounded, a bullet hit his arm and a jet of blood splashed onto his face. It was from Orlando Pereira, his companion in death. Some fell wounded, others screaming in pain and fear. “With a yatagan [knife], one of them, still alive, had his eyes gouged out and his tongue cut off.”[10] When the work was done, they pushed him over the cliff toward the canal, and he rolled down with the rest of the group.

Inside the water, while spinning in the whirlpool, he felt an arm grabbing his neck. It was Orlando Pereira. “He begged me to help him, so I put him on my shoulder and swam. We came out together on the other side.”[11] Pereira had several bullet wounds in his chest. “He told me he was dead and to take care of his wife and son. He handed me his sweater, completely perforated, and died.”[12]

Bustos was the only one who survived to tell the tale. Confronted with Christian Kast[13], he reaffirmed that he saw him at the police station on the day of his detention, but clarified that he was not part of the caravan that shot him a while later.

Interviewed for this report, Bustos pointed out that he actually meant he was not able to identify him. “There were more civilians, but with the lights and the darkness, I didn’t identify them all. I don’t remember seeing Kast there, but he could have been there too.”[14]

Kast acknowledged to the justice system only having heard the story: “On one occasion, a priest told me about an event similar to the one my interlocutor points out, and relating them, I believe it is the same one. That was the first time I had news of what happened in Collipeumo.”[15]

The betrayal and Sylvia’s memories

Sylvia remembers that the only problem Pedro had with the Kast family was an altercation prior to September 11, at his workplace, Cecinas Bavaria. “My brother discovered that they were not paying their workers a percentage of the sales, which was their legal obligation.

So he organized a union, and Don Miguel punished him by demoting him to night watchman at the cold cuts factory. He had to use a weapon. Pedro didn’t like violence, so he resigned”[16], recalls Sylvia.

Despite that episode and her nine months of pregnancy, Sylvia decided to go to the Kast house in Buin to ask her boss for help. In her favor was the fact that at the beginning of the 60s, her family and the Kast family had worked side by side to get the newly created Bavaria soda fountain off the ground, next to the North-South highway, near Buin, where the Vargas family also lived: “Other bosses had helped their employees go free, so that’s why I decided to go to him”[17], she recalled.

At the entrance of the house, Don Michael received her: “He was annoyed. He told me, ‘It shows, Sylvia, that you don’t know what a war is.’ I told him: ‘But what war, Don Miguel? Pedro was just carrying a bread bag and money, nothing more.’ He insisted. ‘No, Sylvia, this is serious, you have no idea.

This is a matter of life and death.’ I answered him, but he told me curtly to go home quietly to have my child.”[18]

Interrogated by the justice system, Michael Kast denied Sylvia’s visit to ask for help: “I do not remember that relatives of Pedro came to my home on September 17, 1973, to ask me for help to find or free him, and I also do not believe that if that had been the case, I would have answered them in the way indicated, since I had affection for the family, as Sylvia and Pedro Vargas Barrientos worked for me, as did their father, Bernabé Vargas.”[19]

Trucks When Minister Elgarrista summoned Michael Kast to testify as an accused in 2003, she was interested in knowing the ownership of the trucks that had participated in the transport of the forcibly disappeared prisoners of Paine. She interrogated him as an accused. As of September 11, 1973, he was the owner of a red Mercedes Benz truck, fire-truck type.

Both Kast and other interrogated civilians agreed judicially that the purpose of the loans was only for the transport of officials and their families to the Paine Sub-prefecture. “I do not remember if these trips were also made during the night; what I am sure of is that my vehicle was never left at the police station without the driver who worked for me.

Carlos, upon returning, would comment to me that they had indeed transported the families of the Paine officials.” [20]

Francisco Luzoro, owner of trucks and leader of the Truckers’ Trade Association –prosecuted for several crimes in Paine– acknowledged that “the operations carried out by Carabinero personnel escorted by us [the civilians] were exclusively to detain people in different places, who were then transported to the Paine Sub-prefecture, without knowing what their final destination was (…)”[21].

He did, however, take the opportunity to partially open the open secret about the participation of other civilians, without compromising himself: “I want to make it clear that I was not the only one providing collaboration with vehicles to Carabinero personnel, but that there were other civilians and that they also had other vehicles (…) but I do not remember who they were, just as there were other pickup trucks, but of different colors.”[22]

Regarding his relationship with the leader of the Paine civilians and the other members of the brigades formed after the coup, Michael Kast was discreet: “[I only know Luzoro] because he is a local hauler, but we do not have a bond of friendship; the same thing happens with Ramón Huidobro (…).

The Carrascos because they have an agricultural plot in Paine, the Tagle brothers because they are children of a farm owner. We never visited each other with these people, since as I pointed out, I only know them.”[23]

Most of the people Kast declared he “only knew” are currently being prosecuted, and some of them have confessed to their participation in the crimes that have been successfully elucidated in Paine.

To this day, in most cases, the justice system has not elucidated which trucks and vehicles were used in the various criminal episodes. It is known, for example, that a red truck transported detainees to and from the San Bernardo Infantry School.

Also, as an exception, it is known which vehicles and which drivers kidnapped the teacher Cristian Víctor Cartagena Pérez, a forcibly disappeared person, teacher at the Chada School and member of the Communist Party.

This was not a problem for Christian Kast to protect Rubén Darío González in 2008, a merchant who collaborated by driving vehicles and who has confessed to his participation in the crime of teacher Cartagena Pérez. Kast signed a “certificate of honorability” in his favor.

“I certify that I have known Mr. Rubén Darío González since his childhood. Likewise, I knew his parents and grandparents, who stood out as correct and respectable people, active participants in commerce, very beloved in the Paine community.

Don Rubén González has always been a normal and very orderly young man. He married and formed a very Christian family in Paine. As I have known, he participates in Christian movements in the commune (…)”[24]

The widow of teacher Cristián Víctor Cartagena Pérez, Holanda Vidal, recalled before the Investigative Police that, at the moment of being kidnapped, her husband was tied with a rope to one of the pickup trucks of the caravan of civilians and military personnel. He was lost on the road, “dragging him along the whole road until arriving at the police station (…)”[25] (EXCERPT)

Source: elmostrador.cl 6/11/2014

Date: 06-11-2014

Minister Cifuentes issues sentence for the kidnapping of residents of the La Estrella de Paine settlement

The minister on special assignment for human rights violation cases of the San Miguel Court of Appeals, Marianela Cifuentes Alarcón, sentenced retired Carabinero officer Nelson Iván Bravo Espinoza to a penalty of ten years and one day of imprisonment as responsible for the qualified kidnappings of Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, committed starting on September 15, 1973, in the “La Estrella” settlement of Huelquén in the Paine commune.

In the civil aspect, the State was ordered to pay the total sum of $520,000,000 (five hundred twenty million pesos) to the victims’ relatives, according to the distribution of amounts specified in the ruling.

The magistrate’s investigation established that: 1° That on September 15, 1973, in the afternoon, police officers assigned to the Paine Carabinero Sub-prefecture appeared at the “La Estrella” settlement of Huelquén in the Paine commune and detained, without legal right, six agricultural workers: Juan Bernardo Albornoz Ramírez, Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado, Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, Luis Enrique Albornoz Prado, Isaías Lázaro Quinteros Espinoza, and Luis Antonio González Pinto. 2° That, immediately thereafter, the detainees were taken to the Paine Carabinero Sub-prefecture, a place where they were kept illegally imprisoned and subjected to interrogations and physical mistreatment. 3° That, subsequently, Juan Bernardo Albornoz Ramírez, Luis Enrique Albornoz Prado, Isaías Lázaro Quinteros Espinoza, and Luis Antonio González Pinto regained their freedom. 4° That, however, since then, the whereabouts of the brothers Hernán Albornoz Prado and Juan Albornoz Prado remain unknown, as they were not placed at the disposal of the corresponding administrative or judicial authority, and it is unknown if they were executed and, in such case, in what manner, on what date, and the place where their remains were buried. 5° That, on that date, the Paine Carabinero Sub-prefecture was under the command of Captain Nelson Iván Bravo Espinoza.

Source: elclarin.cl, March 16, 2018

Minister on special assignment charges former Carabinero with qualified kidnappings during the dictatorship

Marianela Cifuentes investigates human rights violation cases and pointed to retired officer Nelson Bravo Espinoza for the crime against brothers Juan and Hernán Albornoz Prado and Francisco Baltazar Godoy Román.

Marianela Cifuentes, minister on special assignment of the San Miguel Court of Appeals, issued indictments in two proceedings against retired Carabinero officer Nelson Bravo Espinoza, due to his alleged responsibility in crimes linked to human rights violations during the military dictatorship.

According to what was reported by the Judiciary, the measure presented by Cifuentes responds to an accusation regarding the possibility that Bravo committed qualified kidnappings against brothers Juan and Hernán Albornoz Prado in September 1973.

The magistrate’s statement reports that “on September 15, 1973, in the afternoon, at the La Estrella de Paine settlement, brothers Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado and Hernán Fernando Albornoz Prado, along with four other peasants, were detained, without legal right, by Carabinero officials of the Paine Sub-prefecture, a police unit that, to that date, was in charge of Captain Nelson Iván Bravo Espinoza, and subsequently, they were transported to the aforementioned police unit, a place where they were kept locked up, with only part of the detainees regaining their freedom, and the whereabouts of the Albornoz Prado brothers remaining unknown to date.”

Likewise, the authority’s ruling details that the police unit led by Bravo Espinoza detained “without legal right” Francisco Baltazar Godoy Román, whose whereabouts have also not been revealed to the present day.

Source: 24horas.cl, 21.02.2017

Supreme Court sentences former Carabinero for kidnapping and homicide of 7 victims from Paine

The Second Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court sentenced the former head of the Paine Police Station, Nelson Iván Bravo Espinoza, to a total of 37 years in prison for crimes committed against seven residents of Paine in 1973.

Bravo Espinoza, former captain of the Paine Carabineros, was sentenced to 6 years in prison as the author of the qualified kidnappings of student Pedro Vargas Barrientos, an event that occurred on September 13, 1973; and of brothers Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, on September 15 of the same year at the La Esmeralda settlement of Hualquén, and of Jorge Orlando Valenzuela Valenzuela, on October 8, 1973.

All these victims remain, to date, in the status of forcibly disappeared.

The highest court also sentenced Bravo to 5 years in prison as an accomplice to the qualified homicide of student Gustavo Hernán Martínez Vera, on October 6, 1973; of lathe mechanic José González Sepúlveda, an event that occurred between October 11 and 15, 1973; and of Luis Alberto Díaz Manríquez, who were executed at the San Bernardo Infantry School, located at Cerro Chena.

This is only a part of a total of 70 victims left by the military dictatorship in the town of Paine, starting on September 11, 1973.

For the plaintiff lawyer, Nelson Caucoto, “these sentences put an end to a struggle that lasted 46 years, which seems excessive to us, but which, nevertheless, does some justice. Time has done its work, and other defendants in the case died during the course of the investigation.

A huge number of victims from Paine still remain pending, who are also waiting to successfully conclude their proceedings.”

Source: caucoto.cl, October 10th, 2019

Supreme Court sentences former Carabinero for kidnapping and homicide of 7 victims from Paine

The Second Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court sentenced the former head of the Paine Police Station, Nelson Iván Bravo Espinoza, to a total of 37 years in prison for crimes committed against seven residents of Paine in 1973.

Bravo Espinoza, former captain of the Paine Carabineros, was sentenced to 6 years in prison as the author of the qualified kidnappings of student Pedro Vargas Barrientos, an event that occurred on September 13, 1973; and of brothers Fernando and Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, on September 15 of the same year at the La Esmeralda settlement of Hualquén, and of Jorge Orlando Valenzuela Valenzuela, on October 8, 1973.

All these victims remain, to date, in the status of forcibly disappeared.

The highest court also sentenced Bravo to 5 years in prison as an accomplice to the qualified homicide of student Gustavo Hernán Martínez Vera, on October 6, 1973; of lathe mechanic José González Sepúlveda, an event that occurred between October 11 and 15, 1973; and of Luis Alberto Díaz Manríquez, who were executed at the San Bernardo Infantry School, located at Cerro Chena.

This is only a part of a total of 70 victims left by the military dictatorship in the town of Paine, starting on September 11, 1973.

For the plaintiff lawyer, Nelson Caucoto, “these sentences put an end to a struggle that lasted 46 years, which seems excessive to us, but which, nevertheless, does some justice. Time has done its work, and other defendants in the case died during the course of the investigation.

A huge number of victims from Paine still remain pending, who are also waiting to successfully conclude their proceedings.”

Source: elmostrador.cl, 2019/10/07

Testimony of Olga Lizama Calderón (excerpt)

My name is Olga Lizama Calderón, I am the wife of Juan Humberto Albornoz Prado, detained on September 15, 1973, at the La Estrella settlement, Huelquén, Paine. At three in the afternoon, Juan Humberto was working at the settlement.

That day he had told me, “Girl, be careful because they are going to raid here; you just let them check everything. If you oppose them, they are going to take you and the children, and the children will be left even more alone.” Humberto and I were boyfriend and girlfriend for seven years, and we had been married for seven years when they took him.

I was left with two children. At that time, we lived at the entrance of the La Estrella farm. I remember that because of the work he was doing, they took him with his boots on; from there, they transported him to the gate of the farm in the trunk of a vehicle.

When they arrived at the gates of the farm, they took him out with a machine gun and put him in another car, together with his brother Hernán and Don José, the father of both. I remember they were sitting in the vehicle one on top of the other; they sat them in the back, and he left waving goodbye to us, until he disappeared.

My oldest son was tiny; at that time he was 5 years old, he saw everything, he saw when they took his dad, when they put him in the car with the machine gun, he saw everything and he became traumatized seeing all those things.

My brother-in-law had gone to my in-laws’ house to have lunch and to help them with some drums of corn; he was on the list of peasants they were going to take, but they hadn’t gone looking for him. I remember he told me, “If they take my brother, I’m going with him too, Olga.” And they took the three of them to the Paine Sub-prefecture; there they sat them on a gas cylinder and shaved their heads completely.

We knew that because from nine-thirty at night they were releasing all the detainees except for Hernán and Humberto; Don Juan told us that they had Hernán on one side, him in the middle, and on the other side was Humberto, and they were hitting them with a stick.

My husband at that time was a union leader, so they hit his hands a lot, so much that they broke them. After they hit everyone, they released Don Juan, around one or two in the morning; a Carabinero told him, “You old man, you go, but your sons-of-bitches stay here because they think they’re very tough.” When they released him, they took him away at gunpoint, running from Paine to Huelquén; he was wearing a warm coat, and when he arrived at the house, he fell to the ground in the hallway, unconscious, and that’s when my mother-in-law and I went out to see him to know what was happening, and that’s when he told us everything that had happened, everything that was going on. Poor Don Juan, he arrived completely shaved. From the settlement, they took six peasants that the soldiers were looking for with a list. They found them working; those who were on the land were made to eat dirt, they put their feet on their heads! And the one who was working in the grass, “Eat grass!” and they had to eat grass, and those who had long hair, they would tangle it in the rifle and pull the rifle upward; those were the things that the workers themselves commented on later. At that time, my husband was secretary of the Nuevo Horizonte Union and president of the JAP [Supply and Price Board], and even having access to money and merchandise, he never ever kept or left me anything; I went to buy like all the people, I waited in the lines, he was always very honest. When they took him, they offered him to leave and he didn’t want to; he said, “No, let them take me, otherwise they are going to take my girl and what will become of the children.” People, the workers, commented that the boys were very brave, because they took them and they didn’t denounce anyone. (excerpt)

Source: germina.cl 2014 (excerpt)

Patio 29 Behind the iron cross (BOOK)

Patio 29 used to be destined for the burial of the indigent, psychiatric patients, and people who died without being identified (NN). However, between September 1973 and January 1974, its graves were used to hide victims of the repression as NN.

Javiera Bustamante and Stephan Ruderer reconstruct the painful history of the place, using testimonies from the relatives of the forcibly disappeared, letters, documents, and other sources. The book also gives an account of the arduous process of identification and delivery of the bodies, as well as the irregularities that characterized these proceedings.

The powerful photographs that illustrate the volume were taken by visual artist Mara Daruich. Bustamante, Javiera; Ruderer, Stephan

Source: ocholibros.cl no date