The 12 retired officers of the Navy and Carabineros who were prosecuted yesterday by Judge Eliana Quezada for the crime of kidnapping and torture against former political prisoners following the 1973 coup d'état on the training ship Esmeralda, were arrested this morning by agents of the Special Affairs and Human Rights Brigade, led by Commissioner Sandro Gaete.

The accused are Vice Admirals Juan Mackay Barriga and Sergio Barra von Kretschmann, Navy Captain Ricardo Riesco Cornejo, and Carabineros Colonel Nelson López Cofré. Also prosecuted were Navy non-commissioned officers Bertalino Castillo Soto, Jorge Leiva Cordero, Jaime Lazo Pérez, Reginaldo Rebolledo López, Manuel Leiva Valdivieso, Juan Reyes Bausar, Luis Cabezón Cattanzano, and Alejo Esparza Martínez.

All were taken to the PDI barracks in Viña del Mar, and later, at approximately 11:30, transferred to the Valparaíso courts to appear before the visiting minister. The judge must determine which naval or Carabineros facility the accused will be held in.

The resolution was issued due to the illegal arrest and torture of María Eliana Comeném, Alberto Neumann Lagos, Claudina Moreno Cortés, María and Rosa Huerta Sánchez, and María Isabel Vásquez Pezoa.

Source

La Nación, December 1, 2009

Magistrate notifies fourteen former uniformed personnel involved in the Woodward case of their prosecution During the morning, the Human Rights Brigade of the Investigative Police (PDI) began the transfer to the Valparaíso Court of Appeals of the last 14 individuals prosecuted for the disappearance of the English priest Miguel Woodward, who was also tortured aboard the Chilean Navy training ship Esmeralda and subsequently disappeared.

It should be noted that on August 26, Minister María Eliana Quezada ordered the prosecution of these fourteen former uniformed personnel. The events date back to the first days of the military dictatorship, when the Chilean Navy implemented Plan Cochayuyo, designed to repress social organizations and control the area after the military coup.

After 11:00, the retired Carabineros and Navy officials involved in this human rights case began arriving at the Fifth Region Court of Appeals so that the magistrate could notify them of their prosecution and pretrial detention.

The prosecuted individuals are retired Carabineros Héctor Tapia Olivares, Ángel Lorca Fuenzalida, and Enrique Corrales Díaz, all colonels; as well as Major Luis Araya Maureira, Captain Nelson López Cofré, and Sergeant 2nd Class Jorge Leiva Cordero.

Also prosecuted were former Navy officers: Navy Captain Pedro Abregó Diamanti; and retired Marine Infantry non-commissioned officers Manuel Leiva Valdivieso, Juan de Dios Reyes Basaur, Jaime Lazo Pérez, Bertalino Castillo Soto, Alejo Esparza Martínez, Carlos Líbano Riquelme, and Sergio Hevia Fabres.

With this, there are now 33 people prosecuted in this case, which is emblematic of human rights matters in Valparaíso.

Source

Radio Universidad de Chile, August 30, 2010

Judge accuses ten Navy officials of responsibility in the Woodward Case

Judge Julio Miranda Lillo held ten Navy officers and non-commissioned officers responsible for the disappearance of the Chilean-British priest Miguel Woodward, whose physical trail was lost a few days after his arrest in September 1973.

Miguel Woodward Iriberry was a Chilean-British priest who, after the military coup, took refuge in various friends' homes, fearing for his life due to an arrest by Army officers. On September 18, 1973, he returned to his home in Cerro Placeres, where he was intercepted by naval officers who took him through various interrogation points until his physical trail was lost.

This Wednesday, Judge Julio Miranda Lillo presented an accusation against ten sailors for their alleged responsibility in Woodward's disappearance. These are Navy officers and non-commissioned officers who are identified in the charges presented within the framework of the Woodward Case.

The prosecuted sailors are Luis Francisco Pinda Figueroa, Carlos Alberto Miño Muñoz, Guillermo Carlos Inostroza Opazo, José Manuel García Reyes, Marcos Cristián Silva Bravo, Nelson Roberto López Cofre, Jorge Leiva Cordero, Manuel Atilio Leiva Valdivieso, Bertalino Segundo Castillo Soto, and Héctor Fernando Palomino López.

Judge Miranda argued that “the facts outlined above constitute the crime of kidnapping followed by serious harm (possibly resulting in death) to the person of Michael Roy Woodward Iribery, as contemplated by Article 141 of the Penal Code in force at the time of the events, meeting all the requirements that constitute it, as he was deprived of his freedom of movement without legal basis, and kept under detention or confinement in Navy facilities, which has continued from the month of September 1973 onwards, without his whereabouts being known or his remains having been found.” Miguel Woodward was taken to the Universidad Santa María and then transferred to the training ship Esmeralda, an emblematic site of the Chilean armed forces used as a center for political imprisonment and torture during the dictatorship. Due to the deterioration Woodward experienced after the interrogations, he was transferred to the Naval Hospital, with no physical record of him thereafter. Although a naval doctor issued a death certificate for the priest, it was never possible to locate his body. The final investigations were carried out in the mass grave at the Valparaíso cemetery, without positive results. The accusation will be notified to the plaintiffs and then to the defense of the accused, to then begin the plenary stage, prior to the issuance of a first-instance conviction.

Source

Radio Universidad de Chile, May 18, 2011

Minister issues accusation in Woodward case

Valparaíso / Navy did not comment although it stated it has provided full cooperation. The visiting minister of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Julio Miranda Lillo, issued an accusation in the investigation into the case of the aggravated kidnapping of priest Miguel Woodward Iribery, which occurred in September 1973.

The magistrate filed charges against the prosecuted individuals Luis Francisco Pinda Figueroa, Carlos Alberto Miño Muñoz, Guillermo Carlos Inostroza Opazo, José Manuel García Reyes, Marcos Cristián Silva Bravo, Nelson Roberto López Cofre, Jorge Leiva Cordero, Manuel Atilio Leiva Valdivieso, Bertalino Segundo Castillo Soto, and Héctor Fernando Palomino López, as authors of the crime.

In the accusation, Minister Julio Miranda established that "after a harsh interrogation and the application of torture, Woodward was taken in serious condition to the training ship Esmeralda, a vessel that the Navy had designated as a Detention and Interrogation Center, where he was examined by a doctor and treated in the infirmary, a situation of which the respective superiors were made aware, ordering his transfer to the Naval Hospital where his physical trail is lost, given that a Navy doctor who worked at said hospital issued a medical death certificate." In the visiting minister's judgment, "the facts outlined above constitute the crime of kidnapping followed by serious harm (possibly resulting in death) to the person of Michael Roy Woodward Iribery, as contemplated by Article 141 of the Penal Code in force at the time of the events, meeting all the requirements that constitute it, as he was deprived of his freedom of movement without legal basis, and kept under detention or confinement in Navy facilities, which has continued from the month of September 1973 onwards, without his whereabouts being known or his remains having been found." The Navy, meanwhile, stated yesterday that "as this is a strictly judicial matter that is still ongoing, it is not appropriate for the Institution to comment or express an opinion regarding the resolutions of the courts of justice." It was indicated that during the development of the case, the Navy provided all facilities so that the Judiciary could carry out all its proceedings.

Source

Mercuriovalpo.cl, May 19, 2011

Definitive: Judicial rulings determine a truth we did not want to know: savage torture took place on the training ship Esmeralda The ruling by the visiting minister of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Julio Miranda, establishes a legal truth that was an open secret for years in Chile.

Aboard the flagship of our Navy, people were tortured and raped mercilessly; they were also murdered. The convictions were another slap in the face. Three years and one day for two non-commissioned officers.

In total, they will only be imprisoned for 19 days. The sentence was handed down in criminal case Roll No. 943-2007, which investigated the kidnapping of María Eliana Comené Hidalgo, Alberto Enrique Neumann, Claudina Rosa Moreno Cortes, María Elvira Huerta Sánchez, María Isabel Vásquez Pezoa, and Rosa Angélica Huerta Sánchez.

Non-commissioned officers Bertalino Segundo Castillo Soto and Jaime Segundo Lazo Pérez were found responsible and sentenced to three years and one day in prison, which they will never serve, as the sentence was commuted.

That is what they received for kidnapping and then torturing 6 people aboard the training ship Esmeralda. Only two non-commissioned officers, with no one else found guilty, on a ship with hundreds of sailors, with officers in charge... only 2 guilty.

Some others were exempted from responsibility due to having died or being declared insane. "Stay still, we have orders to shoot" It is recorded on page 2,573 of the file "that on September 11, 1973, a group of people were gathered at Cerro La Cruz, summoned by a CUT leader named Manuel Solís.

After a few hours, two Navy trucks arrived at the location, and the house was surrounded by personnel from that branch. They made them lie on the floor with their hands on their heads and legs apart, began to insult and disparage them, kicking them and hitting them with the butts of the rifles they were carrying." Then they loaded them onto a transport, lying face down, and took them to the Molo de Abrigo; in that sector, they placed them against the wall, and their captors, a group of sailors, simulated executions.

Later, they were all taken aboard the "training ship Esmeralda." The welcome they received consisted of insults and rifle-butt blows. The torture began later. "A witness remembers: 'on September 13, I was violated by a group composed of eight sailors inside a bathroom, where, amidst beatings, I had to take off my underwear to see if I had anything hidden inside my body.'" It was not the only time, nor the only person who suffered such cruelties.

Another witness, whose statement is recorded on page 2575, remembers having identified among the detainees Sergio Vuskovic, Mayor of Valparaíso at the time, Alberto Neumann, María Eliana Comené, the Huerta sisters, among others.

She remembers that every day she was interrogated by Navy personnel, who assaulted her with punches and kicks, in addition to the mistreatment; during the entire stay on the "Esmeralda," they made them listen to the beatings that others were subjected to, "they mistreated us for fun," she points out.

The violence included the application of electricity, blows with any blunt object the torturers had available, fists and feet, and, of course, collective rapes of the women. The illegally detained were transferred from the Esmeralda to the ship Lebu and from there to the Maipo, all anchored in Valparaíso.

Some were also occasionally taken to land to a Carabineros unit. The Cochayuyo Plan A member of Carabineros actually testified in the process: "k) Statement of Ricardo Alejandro Riesco Cornejo, on page 326, ratified on page 536 and page 1,181, in which he points out that on September 12 or 13, 1973, he was ordered to report to the 'training ship Esmeralda,' where he was notified that he had to proceed to guard all the people arriving at the ship and all the people who were already being held." He continues by pointing out: "the detainees were interrogated inside the training ship, specifically in the midshipmen's chamber or dining room, by a group of people external to the ship who arrived dressed in civilian clothes and were in charge of Frigate Captain Jaime Román (deceased). As he learned, the interrogating personnel belonged to Carabineros of Chile, though he did not know their names. He adds that on one occasion he witnessed an interrogation where the application of electric current was used so that the detainee would confess faster." According to the torturers themselves, those participating in the interrogations included: Sergeants Alejo Esparza, Jaime Lazo, Bertalino Castillo, nicknamed "El Choro," Francisco Prado Espejo, Valentín Riquelme, nicknamed "Gerónimo," Francisco Lagos, and Héctor Santibáñez and Juan de Dios Reyes Bazeur. The plan intended to capture opponents of the regime in the V Region was called "Cochayuyo." In the Lebu were the women, Maipo to Pisagua, and the Esmeralda was the torture center. According to the statement of Rafael Guillermo Mac-Kay Backler, on pages 373, 1,061 and judicial 1,284, ratified on page 1,287, "upon arriving in Valparaíso on September 11, 1973, from Talcahuano, he learned of the military pronouncement. The Commander of the Esmeralda, Navy Captain Jorge Sabugo, informed the midshipmen that people would arrive at the Molo de Abrigo as detainees, and they had to proceed to guide them from the moment they got off the trucks until they reached the ship Lebu or Maipo." "A large number of people began to arrive, including men, women, and some foreigners, a situation that occurred day and night," Mac-Kay states. Other guards of the Esmeralda testified that "the prisoners were held 24 hours a day in the midshipmen's between-decks, where there were approximately five rows of double bunks; he remembers that on occasions they were taken from the place through a restricted access, to which he did not have access; some detainees arrived complaining of pain, to which he provided dipyrone." They add that, "the detainees inside the training ship were male, but he remembers that there was a foreign woman who was there for a short time; the women were held inside the ship Lebu." Between one thousand and 1,500 detainees on the Maipo alone It is estimated by a jailer that inside the Maipo there were between one thousand and 1,500 detainees after the coup. The judicial statement of Augusto Pedreros Silva, on page 565, is clear: "starting on September 11, 1973, I was assigned the task of sea guard, which I performed at the entrance door of the ACANAV building, in order to control the entry of personnel." He remembers that "the entry of civilian detainees was through the Silva Palma Barracks and from there they were taken by the Marines to the third floor, a place set up for interrogation at the ACANAV." And he continues: "The detainees were lined up one after another, with one arm resting on the person in front of them, and they were hooded. He adds that one of the interrogators during the first period was Officer Jaime Román Figueroa, who had been a professor at the Academy. Subsequently, a group of Marines began to perform that function, whose chief was a non-commissioned officer with the surname Leiva. He points out that the interrogations were accompanied by torture, as the screams of the detainees could be heard, which consisted, among other things, of applying current; he affirms this because he had seen, on occasions, Investigaciones officials carrying magnets in their hands. Finally, he points out that there was Carabineros personnel in the facility, remembering, in particular, a Lieutenant nicknamed 'La Paloma,' who would correspond to Lieutenant Patricia Orellana Alvarado, whom he saw passing by the interrogation rooms." Electric plates on the detainees A witness pointed out on page 2,588: "They took me with a kind of hard fabric bag on my head, then, in an office where there were three officers, they took off the bag and handcuffs; one named Cristian Gantes and Jaime Román Figueroa, there I was interrogated." "I do not remember if the next day or hours after that event, they covered my head again with a bag and took me to an upper floor, arriving at a kind of dungeon; there they tied me by my back to a wooden pole, with handcuffs, they took off my clothes from the waist up; in the interrogation they asked me about weapons, while at the same time they put electric plates on me and so that I would not faint they threw water on me violently or threw themselves on me abruptly; said interrogation was repeated several times in a row and was directed by Jaime Román Figueroa, whom I could identify by his perfume and voice. Finally," she adds, "I was on the Esmeralda until September 18, 1973." What one of the convicted stated Page 2600: "That while giving an investigative and evidentiary statement, the accused Bertalino Segundo Castillo Soto, on pages 192, 340 and 1,033, points out (...) Regarding the detainees they interrogated, they arrived at the War Academy transported by Carabineros of Chile and the Gendarmerie of Chile. (...) He also points out that he had to dress in civilian clothes at the moment of interrogating a person, covering his face with a ski mask so that they would not recognize him, in order to prevent future attacks or personal or family reprisals. He states that the interrogation techniques were only dialogue, he only asked and they answered, there were no beatings, torture, or degrading or inhuman treatment, nor the application of electric current or torture of any other type." Convictions constitute a new slap in the face to the victims The statements are of a cynicism that irritates, which is why the visiting magistrate rejected them for not being in accordance with the reality of the facts. However, having so much time passed, they were acquitted of the rapes, as the court could not consider them proven, and although they did happen, the judge also could not convince himself that the convicted were the ones who raped the women. Three years and one day was the sentence. Added to the benefits, they will never be imprisoned for the aberrations they committed. Only the 19 days when they were arrested for the first time. It is estimated by Human Rights organizations that there were 500 political prisoners who were on the Esmeralda, 1,000 on the ship Maipo, and 4,000 on the ship Lebu. Through the Valparaíso Stadium passed nearly 3,000 people, through the War Academy and the Silva Palma Barracks, 4,000, all of whom were tortured and several of them murdered. A bloody testimony María Eliana, a Spanish literature student, relates: "They were stuck on all the walls, I counted eight marines, some hooded and others with their faces painted black. They tell me to undress. I started to undress and left my bottom part on, because I had my menstrual pad on. Then, when they forced me to even take off my panties, I said I couldn't, because I was indisposed. They forced me to do it and that is where all the feminine rebellion comes in, the rebellion of the fighter; no matter how much they wanted to make us feel like animals, the moment arrived when the dignity of the human being rebelled against all that. And my anger, my indignation, was such that I took off my panties, took the pad with blood, and put it on the face of the lieutenant who was directing the group." It was not enough: "After that, still naked, by order of the lieutenant, two marines from behind took my buttocks and bent down to look through my anus." They were surely the same ones who raped women to demonstrate their power and lower the dignity of the detainees. They covered their faces with ski masks and hid their ranks. "On the Esmeralda," María Eliana remembers, "there was violence 24 hours a day; they would take out the comrades, beat them, torture them, they would return bruised and vomiting blood." "When they transferred me to the Lebu, we were separated from the comrades who were in the holds. We were in the cabins and there were so many of us that we couldn't breathe; we had to sleep sitting on the floor. They gave us food only once a day, at 9 in the morning. They were some beans that even had worms; once we complained, they told us mockingly, 'why are you complaining if we are giving you meat?'" The treatment was truly inhuman and cruel. Among the torturers there were also civilians and carabineros. On one occasion, María Eliana relates, "they took me to a cabin that had been set up as an interrogation room and there was a lieutenant who began to grope me and shout, saying: 'defend yourself now, you bitch!' He groped me in a frightening way; it was more than an hour of just that." The horror of the Naval War Academy María Eliana also passed through the Naval War Academy on the Playa Ancha hill. "I was there for about four weeks; they took me out every night to interrogate me, they hit my ears with their hands, they put current on my tongue, in my vagina. They took us out to have fun with us, to sexually abuse us. There were mass rapes. In the end, one disconnects, tries to sublimate what is happening, but it is impossible to forget; in fact, when I was already in prison, I developed a serious infection, with vomiting and fever." "They sent me to the Naval Hospital and there they said it was just a gallbladder attack and they sent me back to prison. However, it was something much more serious. It was gonorrhea, and it was impossible to know how and where I had contracted it: on the Esmeralda, on the Lebu, at the Academy? The only thing clear is that I was left with my endometrium totally and absolutely destroyed," she finishes relating. The priest Miguel R. Woodward It is estimated that there were about 40 women detained on the Esmeralda, who were subjected to all kinds of mistreatment, torture, humiliation, and rape. Among the detainees, it is worth noting the presence of the Chilean-British Catholic priest, Miguel R. Woodward, who died as a result of the torture when, on September 22, 1973, he was taken to the Valparaíso Naval Hospital on the recommendation of a doctor from the Navy itself. Although the Catholic Church claimed his body, it was never handed over to them, and he was buried in a mass grave over which a road was later built.

Source

Cambio21, May 17, 2014

Other Information

Sentence in the Case of Father Miguel Woodward, murdered by the Chilean Navy in September 1973 Declaration After the Sentencing Ruling in the Case of Father Miguel Woodward, Tortured and Murdered by the Chilean Navy in September 1973-

The Sentence

On May 8, 2013, Minister Julio Miranda issued a sentence in the criminal case for the torture and murder of Father Miguel Woodward at the hands of the Chilean Navy. The lawsuit by Patricia Woodward, the priest's sister, had been filed 11 years earlier in 2002 and was investigated by three Ministers successively.

The sentences handed down against the 10 accused are as follows: José Manuel García Reyes and Héctor Palomino López for the crimes of kidnapping with serious harm (death): three years and one day, with which they are immediately free.

Carlos Miño, Marcos Silva, Guillermo Inostroza, Luis Pinda, and Bertalino Castillo: acquitted. Manuel Leiva: acquitted (due to insanity). Nelson López and Jorge Leiva Cordero: no pronouncements issued (due to death).

The sentence will be appealed before the Valparaíso Court of Appeals and, if applicable, before the Supreme Court. In addition, the civil lawsuit for reparations is granted, reduced from the 500,000,000 pesos requested to 50,000,000.

This amount, if confirmed in the higher courts, will be dedicated 20% to recovering the travel expenses of the plaintiff between Spain (where she resides) and Chile. Conclusions The truth about Miguel's death has been revealed and the slanders directed against him have been refuted.

It is regretted that Miguel's body, hidden by the Navy, has not yet been found. It is required that the President of the Nation, his Government, and Parliament urgently undertake a reform of Chile's judicial system regarding human rights violation cases and the Navy.

It is also required that the candidates for the Presidency and Parliament in the November elections commit to carrying out such reforms. We are grateful for the support provided by: Some entities of the Government of Chile, in particular the Human Rights Program, the Ministry of Justice, and the Investigative Brigade of Crimes Against Human Rights of the PDI.

Successive British Ambassadors and members of successive British Governments, a member of the British royal family, and members of both houses of the British Parliament. The Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales.

The Christian Communities of the Catholic Church in Chile. The lawyers who have worked on the case, most pro bono. The media. Amnesty International and other human rights organizations. The members of the "Friends of Miguel" organization. Countless other people.

The Distorted History

The history of Miguel's death told in the Sentence is far from the facts described by eyewitnesses in the case file: In the Sentence, one of the witnesses from the Federico Santa María University attested to the torture that Miguel suffered at the hands of: "....a Marine, with the surname García, [who] submerged him and took him out of the pool with water constantly, with the purpose of making him talk." Another witness said: "he was with his hands resting on the wall and his legs open, next to him was Lieutenant Montenegro and I heard him ask him about his status as a priest, about his girlfriend, and how many points a cross has. Upon answering that four, Lieutenant Montenegro orders him to be given four rifle-butt blows..." However, the Minister seems to give little importance to the responsibility of the high commands in these criminal acts that occurred at the Santa María University. In this regard, the testimony of Captain Sergio Valverde (accused by Minister Quezada and dismissed by Minister Miranda), responsible for the naval unit that occupied the University, is significant. He said that he found out the next day what had happened to Miguel there and informed the then Chief of the General Staff of the I Naval Zone, Captain Aldoney (accused by Minister Quezada and dismissed by Minister Miranda). The latter told him not to worry and to transfer Miguel to the Naval War Academy -where he himself had his office-. Regarding what happened to Miguel at the Naval War Academy, a witness, who...

had been detained and taken there, said of Miguel (whom she recognized in a photo years later) that she had seen him in the courtyard of the Academy "blindfolded and with his hands tied behind his back, barefoot, and he was forced to stay within a square from which he could not leave, because he was beaten with the butt of a rifle....".

Later, Miguel was seen by Carabineros Lieutenant Nelson López. When he was near the interrogation rooms, he opened the door to one of them, seeing inside a male detainee "with a bare torso and hooded....he was standing and was being interrogated by a group of people, among them people from Carabineros and apparently some Officers...".

The Minister does not mention other background information contained in the Case File regarding how, according to Lt. Nelson Jofre, the naval officers who witnessed—and could have participated in the tortures (as implied by Lt.

Nelson López)—included Captain (now retired Admiral) Juan Mackay and Lt. (now retired Navy Captain) Ricardo Riesco. Both were charged by Minister Quezada and subsequently dismissed by Minister Miranda.

Regarding the Esmeralda, the Minister states briefly in his Sentence that Miguel was "taken to the Training Ship Esmeralda, to be examined by a doctor." However, in the Case File, the ship's nurses testified that the ship's doctor was not on board that day.

Such was Miguel's suffering that a witness, also a prisoner on the Esmeralda, said of him "...upon looking at him, he could observe that he was in very poor physical condition, he was moaning a lot, it was an agonizing moan, he was very badly treated, his hands were very red, apparently with his fingers broken, and one of his fingers was even swollen and blackish." Regarding what had happened to Miguel, Captain MacCawley, former Director of the Naval Hospital, said that Aldoney had commented to him that "the former priest was never detained on the ship Esmeralda, much less subjected to torture, and was only taken there by mistake in search of medical aid." For his part, Admiral Adolfo Walbaum, Chief of the I Naval Zone and Intendant of Valparaíso in 1973, said that Aldoney had told him that "a priest of British origin, surnamed Woodward, had died and that his death had occurred, apparently, in a shootout." In any case, the Minister makes no reference in his Sentence to the fact that Miguel died while he was on the Esmeralda. But that is how the ship's Second Commander, Eduardo Barrison, testified on two occasions before Minister Quezada. Regarding what happened at the Naval Hospital, the Minister says that, from the Esmeralda, Miguel was transferred (alive) to the Naval Hospital, "since a Navy doctor who worked at said facility issued a medical death certificate." However, this doctor, Dr. Costa Canessa, testified before Minister Quezada that he had been ordered to sign a partially filled-out certificate stating that Miguel had died of "cardio-respiratory arrest" after having been found on "the public thoroughfare." In reality, according to Dr. Costa, Miguel could have suffered a fall, and the fall "may have been caused by violent blows, perhaps fists, rifle butts...". Furthermore, he said that his superiors did not even allow him to see Miguel's body. Finally, in a verbal statement to the Police—which he later retracted—Dr. Costa Canessa said he believed the person who had handed him the partially filled-out certificate was the doctor from the Latorre, Lt. (later retired Admiral) Kenneth Gleiser. The False End of the Story: It is striking that Minister Miranda's Sentence leaves Miguel's story at the moment he was transferred to the Naval Hospital, where a death certificate was issued. The real story—as we detail in a Memoir we are finalizing—is very different. For the most part, it was recounted before the Minister and the Police by eyewitnesses. Miguel had arrived, in a comatose state, in a van stained with his blood at the pier where the Esmeralda was docked. It is not known why they took him to the Esmeralda, where there was no doctor at that time, and not directly to the Naval Hospital, which was closer to the War Academy (perhaps it was to torture him more). At the Prat pier, where the ship was docked, he was attended to by a doctor from the cruiser Latorre, who pronounced him dying, probably due to the heavy blows that had destroyed his internal organs. He was taken on board on a stretcher despite the protests of the Second Commander, who wanted him taken directly to the Naval Hospital. Apparently, the doctor accompanied him on board the Esmeralda, where he was attended to by nurses. After Miguel's death on the Esmeralda, his body, accompanied by four Marines, was taken directly to the Naval Hospital morgue. A sailor who was guarding the morgue that day declared before Minister Quezada that he was later ordered to take Miguel's body to the Gustavo Fricke Hospital in Viña del Mar. There, he deposited it in another morgue, where about 15 bodies of people murdered by the Navy were already lying. That is where the trail is lost. On September 25, a van went up to the Playa Ancha Cemetery in Valparaíso with two sailors. They told the Administrator that they were carrying the body of a foreign priest, but no one saw his face because he was wrapped in a shroud. In the presence of the Administrator, they buried him in a grave without a headstone. Later, Patricia attended an attempted exhumation at the site indicated by the Administrator. From there, Patricia made a public appeal for more information. A few weeks later, a Deacon of the Church who had been a gravedigger at the Cemetery in 1973 came forward. At that time, he said, the Cemetery had been taken over by the Navy, which used it to clandestinely bury the bodies of those murdered. One night, it was that gravedigger's turn to bury three bodies, with sailors pointing machine guns at him. All three were tall, thin men (as Miguel was), and one had a bullet wound in his chest that was still bleeding. The gravedigger and two of his companions were forced to bury the three bodies together in a single grave. The Minister ordered another exhumation, again without success. Someone told Patricia that a general "cleanup" had been carried out in that area in the late 80s, with the remains being thrown into the sea or incinerated. That is the real story of what happened to Miguel at the end of his life. The former head of the Federico Santa María University, where Miguel suffered "water torture" (in the pool), was charged during the summary proceedings but later dismissed. The Chief of Staff of the Naval Zone, Navy Captain Guillermo Aldoney, was promoted to Admiral and was responsible for the personal security of Pope John Paul II when he visited Chile in 1987. Before that visit, we informed His Holiness of Miguel's death and denounced the collusion with the Navy of the Catholic hierarchy of Valparaíso. The Apostolic Nuncio in Spain confirmed to us that the Pope had received our letter, but even so, the pontiff was photographed giving the Sacrament of Communion to General Pinochet, a figure who, at that time, was excommunicated ipso facto by a decree of the Episcopal Conference against torture. Later, Admiral Aldoney was appointed to preside over a steel company, privatized by the military regime. The doctor from the cruiser Latorre who had attended to Miguel was promoted to Admiral and presided over the Navy's health services. Captain Barison was the Second Commander of the Esmeralda, a ship that served, with his knowledge, for the torture of more than one hundred prisoners. He was not even charged. Appeals: The sentence will be appealed on the grounds of: The extreme leniency of the sentences handed down against the only two convicted persons The fact that, of the 33 people charged by Minister Quezada (including four retired Admirals), only 7 were "accused" (no officers among them) The obstruction of Justice, up to the present time, by some members of the Navy High Command, including two Commanders-in-Chief who were implicated by the testimony of the Navy Auditor General (having not even been charged) Patricia Woodward Fred Bennetts

Press Pre-trial detention for four (r) officers for kidnapping on the Ship Esmeralda The investigating judge of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Eliana Victoria Quezada, issued indictments against three retired naval officers, one from Carabineros, and eight others implicated in the kidnapping of six people on board the Training Ship Esmeralda, after the 1973 coup d'état.

According to the judicial investigation, María Eliana Comené, Alberto Neumann Lagos, Claudina Moreno Cortés, María Elvira Huerta Sánchez, Rosa Angélica Huerta Sánchez, and María Isabel Vásquez Pezoa were held against their will inside the training ship Esmeralda.

The accused are retired Navy Vice Admirals Sergio Barra von Kretschmann, Juan Mackay Barriga, and Ricardo Riesco Cornejo; in addition to Carabineros officer Nelson López Cofré; and Bertalino Castillo Soto, Jorge Leiva Cordero, Jaime Lazo Pérez, Reginaldo Rebolledo López, Manuel Leiva Valdivieso, Juan Reyes Bausar, Luis Cabezón Cattanzano, and Alejo Esparza Martínez. "The detainees entered pre-trial detention in Navy and Carabineros facilities, except for one who remained under house arrest for health reasons," the Judiciary reported.

The magistrate also submitted to trial two former Army officers, Marcelo Moren Brito and Rubén Fiedler Alvarado, who are in pre-trial detention in facilities of that armed institution, for the qualified homicide of Alejandro Delfín Villalobos Díaz, which occurred on January 19, 1975 in Viña del Mar.

Source: emol.cl, November 30, 2009 Sentence in the Case of Father Miguel Woodward, murdered by the Chilean Navy in September 1973 Statement After the Ruling of the Sentence in the Case of Father Miguel Woodward, Tortured and Murdered by the Chilean Navy in September 1973-

The Sentence

On May 8, 2013, Minister Julio Miranda handed down a sentence in the criminal case for the torture and murder of Father Miguel Woodward at the hands of the Chilean Navy. The complaint by Patricia Woodward, the priest's sister, had been filed 11 years earlier in 2002 and was investigated by three Ministers successively. The sentences handed down against the 10 accused are as follows:

• José Manuel García Reyes and Héctor Palomino López for the crimes of kidnapping with serious injury (death): three years and one day, with which they are released immediately
• Carlos Miño, Marcos Silva, Guillermo Inostroza, Luis Pinda, and Bertalino Castillo: acquitted
• Manuel Leiva: acquitted (due to dementia)
• Nelson López and Jorge Leiva Cordero: no pronouncements issued (due to death)

The sentence will be appealed before the Valparaíso Court of Appeals and, if applicable, before the Supreme Court. In addition, the civil lawsuit for reparations is granted, reduced from the 500,000,000 pesos requested to 50,000,000.

This amount, if confirmed in the higher courts, will be dedicated 20% to recovering the travel expenses of the plaintiff between Spain (where she resides) and Chile. Conclusions The truth about Miguel's death has been revealed and the slanders directed against him have been refuted.

It is regretted that Miguel's body, hidden by the Navy, has not yet been found. It is required that the President of the Nation, his Government, and Parliament urgently undertake a reform of Chile's judicial system regarding cases of human rights violations and the Navy.

It is also required that candidates for the Presidency and Parliament in the November elections commit to carrying out such reforms. We are grateful for the support provided by:

• Some entities of the Government of Chile, in particular the Human Rights Program, the Ministry of Justice, and the Human Rights Crimes Investigation Brigade of the PDI
• Successive British Ambassadors and members of successive British Governments, a member of the British royal family, and members of both houses of the British Parliament
• The Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales
• The Christian Communities of the Catholic Church in Chile
• The lawyers who have worked on the case, most pro bono
• The media
• Amnesty International and other human rights organizations
• The members of the "Friends of Miguel" organization
• Countless other people

The Distorted History

The story of Miguel's death told in the Sentence is far from the facts described by eyewitnesses in the case File: In the Sentence, one of the witnesses from the Federico Santa María University attested to the tortures that Miguel suffered at the hands of: «....a Marine, surnamed García, [who] constantly submerged him and pulled him out of the pool with water, with the aim of making him talk».

Another witness said: «he was with his hands resting on the wall and his legs spread, next to him was Lieutenant Montenegro and I heard him ask him about his status as a priest, about his girlfriend, and how many points a cross has.

Upon answering that it has four, Lieutenant Montenegro orders him to be given four rifle butt blows...». However, the Minister seems to give little importance to the responsibility of the high commands in these criminal acts that occurred at the Santa María University.

In this regard, the testimony of Captain Sergio Valverde (charged by Minister Quezada and dismissed by Minister Miranda), responsible for the naval unit that occupied the University, is significant. He said that he found out the next day what had happened to Miguel there and informed the then Chief of Staff of the I Naval Zone, Captain Aldoney (charged by Minister Quezada and dismissed by Minister Miranda).

The latter told him not to worry and to transfer Miguel to the Naval War Academy—where he himself had his office—. Regarding what happened to Miguel at the Naval War Academy, a witness, who had been detained and taken there, said of Miguel (whom she recognized in a photo years later) that she had seen him in the courtyard of the Academy «blindfolded and with his hands tied behind his back, barefoot, and he was forced to stay within a square from which he could not leave, because he was beaten with the butt of a rifle....».

Later, Miguel was seen by Carabineros Lieutenant Nelson López. When he was near the interrogation rooms, he opened the door to one of them, seeing inside a male detainee «with a bare torso and hooded....he was standing and was being interrogated by a group of people, among them people from Carabineros and apparently some Officers...».

The Minister does not mention other background information contained in the Case File regarding how, according to Lt. Nelson Jofre, the naval officers who witnessed—and could have participated in the tortures (as implied by Lt.

Nelson López)—included Captain (now retired Admiral) Juan Mackay and Lt. (now retired Navy Captain) Ricardo Riesco. Both were charged by Minister Quezada and subsequently dismissed by Minister Miranda.

Regarding the Esmeralda, the Minister states briefly in his Sentence that Miguel was «taken to the Training Ship Esmeralda, to be examined by a doctor». However, in the Case File, the ship's nurses testified that the ship's doctor was not on board that day.

Such was Miguel's suffering that a witness, also a prisoner on the Esmeralda, said of him «...upon looking at him, he could observe that he was in very poor physical condition, he was moaning a lot, it was an agonizing moan, he was very badly treated, his hands were very red, apparently with his fingers broken, and one of his fingers was even swollen and blackish».

Regarding what had happened to Miguel, Captain MacCawley, former Director of the Naval Hospital, said that Aldoney had commented to him that «the former priest was never detained on the ship Esmeralda, much less subjected to torture, and was only taken there by mistake in search of medical aid».

For his part, Admiral Adolfo Walbaum, Chief of the I Naval Zone and Intendant of Valparaíso in 1973, said that Aldoney had told him that «a priest of British origin, surnamed Woodward, had died and that his death had occurred, apparently, in a shootout».

In any case, the Minister makes no reference in his Sentence to the fact that Miguel died while he was on the Esmeralda. But that is how the ship's Second Commander, Eduardo Barrison, testified on two occasions before Minister Quezada.

Regarding what happened at the Naval Hospital, the Minister says that, from the Esmeralda, Miguel was transferred (alive) to the Naval Hospital, «since a Navy doctor who worked at said facility issued a medical death certificate».

However, this doctor, Dr. Costa Canessa, testified before Minister Quezada that he had been ordered to sign a partially filled-out certificate stating that Miguel had died of «cardio-respiratory arrest» after having been found on «the public thoroughfare».

In reality, according to Dr. Costa, Miguel could have suffered a fall, and the fall «may have been caused by violent blows, perhaps fists, rifle butts...». Furthermore, he said that his superiors did not even allow him to see Miguel's body.

Finally, in a verbal statement to the Police—which he later retracted—Dr. Costa Canessa said he believed the person who had handed him the partially filled-out certificate was the doctor from the Latorre, Lt. (later retired Admiral) Kenneth Gleiser.

The False End of the Story: It is striking that Minister Miranda's Sentence leaves Miguel's story at the moment he was transferred to the Naval Hospital, where a death certificate was issued. The real story—as we detail in a Memoir we are finalizing—is very different.

For the most part, it was recounted before the Minister and the Police by eyewitnesses. Miguel had arrived, in a comatose state, in a van stained with his blood at the pier where the Esmeralda was docked.

It is not known why they took him to the Esmeralda, where there was no doctor at that time, and not directly to the Naval Hospital, which was closer to the War Academy (perhaps it was to torture him more).

At the Prat pier, where the ship was docked, he was attended to by a doctor from the cruiser Latorre, who pronounced him dying, probably due to the heavy blows that had destroyed his internal organs. He was taken on board on a stretcher despite the protests of the Second Commander, who wanted him taken directly to the Naval Hospital.

Apparently, the doctor accompanied him on board the Esmeralda, where he was attended to by nurses. After Miguel's death on the Esmeralda, his body, accompanied by four Marines, was taken directly to the Naval Hospital morgue.

A sailor who was guarding the morgue that day declared before Minister Quezada that he was later ordered to take Miguel's body to the Gustavo Fricke Hospital in Viña del Mar. There, he deposited it in another morgue, where about 15 bodies of people murdered by the Navy were already lying.

That is where the trail is lost. On September 25, a van went up to the Playa Ancha Cemetery in Valparaíso with two sailors. They told the Administrator that they were carrying the body of a foreign priest, but no one saw his face because he was wrapped in a shroud.

In the presence of the Administrator, they buried him in a grave without a headstone. Later, Patricia attended an attempted exhumation at the site indicated by the Administrator. From there, Patricia made a public appeal for more information.

A few weeks later, a Deacon of the Church who had been a gravedigger at the Cemetery in 1973 came forward. At that time, he said, the Cemetery had been taken over by the Navy, which used it to clandestinely bury the bodies of those murdered.

One night, it was that gravedigger's turn to bury three bodies, with sailors pointing machine guns at him. All three were tall, thin men (as Miguel was), and one had a bullet wound in his chest that was still bleeding.

The gravedigger and two of his companions were forced to bury the three bodies together in a single grave. The Minister ordered another exhumation, again without success. Someone told Patricia that a general "cleanup" had been carried out in that area in the late 80s, with the remains being thrown into the sea or incinerated.

That is the real story of what happened to Miguel at the end of his life. The former head of the Federico Santa María University, where Miguel suffered "water torture" (in the pool), was charged during the summary proceedings but later dismissed.

The Chief of Staff of the Naval Zone, Navy Captain Guillermo Aldoney, was promoted to Admiral and was responsible for the personal security of Pope John Paul II when he visited Chile in 1987. Before that visit, we informed His Holiness of Miguel's death and denounced the collusion with the Navy of the Catholic hierarchy of Valparaíso.

The Apostolic Nuncio in Spain confirmed to us that the Pope had received our letter, but even so, the pontiff was photographed giving the Sacrament of Communion to General Pinochet, a figure who, at that time, was excommunicated ipso facto by a decree of the Episcopal Conference against torture.

Later, Admiral Aldoney was appointed to preside over a steel company, privatized by the military regime. The doctor from the cruiser Latorre who had attended to Miguel was promoted to Admiral and presided over the Navy's health services.

Captain Barison was the Second Commander of the Esmeralda, a ship that served, with his knowledge, for the torture of more than one hundred prisoners. He was not even charged. Appeals: The sentence will be appealed on the grounds of:

• The extreme leniency of the sentences handed down against the only two convicted persons
• The fact that, of the 33 people charged by Minister Quezada (including four retired Admirals), only 7 were "accused" (no officers among them)
• The obstruction of Justice, up to the present time, by some members of the Navy High Command, including two Commanders-in-Chief who were implicated by the testimony of the Navy Auditor General (having not even been charged)

Patricia Woodward Fred Bennetts Source lemondediplomatique.cl, May 1, 2013 Justice establishes that torture occurred on the training ship Esmeralda in 1973 The visiting minister Julio Miranda, of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, issued an indictment this Wednesday against 10 people for the torture and qualified kidnapping of the Anglo-Chilean priest Miguel Woodward Iriberry.

Woodward was detained on September 18, 1973 in his house in Cerro Placeres by a naval patrol. The accused, who are officers and non-commissioned officers of the Navy against whom the justice system brought charges, are the prosecuted Luis Francisco Pinda Figueroa, Carlos Alberto Miño Muñoz, Guillermo Carlos Inostroza Opazo, José Manuel García Reyes, Marcos Cristián Silva Bravo, Nelson Roberto López Cofre, Jorge Leiva Cordero, Manuel Atilio Leiva Valdivieso, Bertalino Segundo Castillo Soto, and Héctor Fernando Palomino López.

Magistrate Miranda accuses all of them as authors of the religious man's disappearance. After the investigation, reopened within the framework of the trials for human rights violations, it was determined, as stated in the process: “ I.- That the Naval War Academy located in the city of Valparaíso, after September 11, 1973, suspended the educational activities that were proper to it, with the Intelligence Service of the Command of the Internal Security Jurisdictional Area of the First Naval Zone, called SICAJSI, being installed in said facility, a hierarchical organization on which different groups depended, formed mainly by Navy personnel, and to a lesser extent by Carabineros and Investigaciones Police. The main function was to dismantle groups opposed to the military regime established in the country, proceeding for this purpose to order the capture of people who were militants or sympathizers of any political party or movement of the center, left, or revolutionary, and their subsequent transfer to Navy Units enabled as Detention and Interrogation Centers, in which different groups of interrogators acted. II.- That in order to obtain information on the activities of those opposed to the prevailing regime, the captured were subjected to multiple interrogation sessions with the application of physical and psychological torment of various kinds. Thus, within the framework described above, days after September 11, 1973, and being among the people sought by the Intelligence agencies, the priest Miguel Roy Woodward Iriberry, after having hidden for a few days in friends' houses, returned at night to his home located at Cerro Placeres No. 1, where he was apprehended by a group of Marines who took him to the Santa María University and then to the Naval War Academy, without any administrative or judicial order to justify it. III.- That after a strong interrogation and application of torments, Woodward is taken in a serious state of health to the Training Ship Esmeralda, a ship that the Navy had designated as a Detention and Interrogation Center, where he was examined by a doctor and attended to in the Infirmary, a situation of which the respective Superiority is made aware, ordering his transfer to the Naval Hospital where his physical trail is lost, since a Navy doctor who worked at said hospital issued a medical death certificate. IV.- That on the other hand, there is also an entry in the Burial Register of Cemetery No. 3 of Playa Ancha, however, despite an extensive excavation diligence having been carried out at the place determined by the background information, it concluded without result”. In the visiting minister's judgment, “the facts outlined above configure the existence of the crime of Kidnapping followed by serious injury (possibly death) in the person of Michael Roy Woodward Iribery, which is contemplated by article 141 of the Penal Code, in force at the time of the events, meeting all the requirements that configure it, since he was deprived of his freedom of movement without right, being kept under detention or confinement in Navy facilities, which has continued from the month of September 1973 onwards, without his whereabouts being known or his remains having been found”. Source: lasegunda.cl, May 8, 2011