Levy Segundo Arraño Sancho, married, father of one, agricultural worker, President of the San Isidro de Quillota settlement, and a militant of the Movement of Unitary Popular Action - Worker-Peasant (MAPU-OC), was detained on January 11, 1974, when he voluntarily presented himself at the No. 2 "Aconcagua" Infantry Regiment in Quillota.

His spouse, Lidia Araya Insunza, and his father, Rufino Arraño Cabrera, visited him at the Regiment between January 11 and January 16. After January 17, all traces of the detainee were lost. During those days, military forces in the Quillota area carried out numerous arrests of individuals based on their public positions or their militancy, which had links to the Unidad Popular government.

The arrests occurred in Quillota and in surrounding rural areas such as El Manzanar, San Isidro, San Pedro, La Tetera, and La Cruz. Some were peasants, others were officials of agricultural institutions; all were in one way or another related to the Agrarian Reform process in the area.

The detainees were taken to the police station and later to the Army Cavalry School in Quillota. A military patrol raided Levy Arraño's house and left a summons for him to appear at the No. 2 "Aconcagua" Regiment in Quillota.

Due to this summons, he presented himself on January 11, along with Hugo Aranda Bruna, who had been the Secretary of the San Isidro settlement committee, of which Arraño had been President; both were detained.

As previously stated, Arraño was able to be visited at the Regiment, but this situation ended abruptly on January 17; that day, his family was informed that Levy Arraño had been released at 6:00 PM. A conscript with the surname Mondaca, now deceased, informed the family at that time that he had been taken out of the Regiment in a white pickup truck.

Coincidentally with these events, on January 19, 1974, according to the official version of the time, when a group of 8 prisoners was being transported in a convoy toward the Quillota Cavalry School, it was attacked by a group of extremists who initiated a shootout, an opportunity the detainees used to escape.

The version added that the escape was prevented by "killing" six of the fugitives: Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna, Julio Arturo Joo Pardo, Víctor Enrique Fuenzalida, Angel Mario Díaz Castro, Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez, and Osvaldo Mario Manzano; and that two others, Rubén Guillermo Cabezas Pares and Pablo Gac Fuenzalida, managed to flee.

This version says nothing about Arraño Sancho, but the fact is that he has also remained missing since that day, January 18. The bodies of the 6 dead were thrown under the bridge leading to the Cavalry School.

Subsequently, the families of these victims learned that the prisoners had been executed by a military patrol under the command of the then-Captain Francisco Pérez E. The official version has been rejected, given that one of the habitual procedures for eliminating opponents was precisely to apply the so-called "escape law," by virtue of which prisoners are forced to run and are riddled with bullets or simply executed, justifying it with the statement that they were attempting to flee.

In the alleged confrontation, none of the attackers were killed or wounded, and regarding the soldiers, it was reported only that Captain Francisco Javier Pérez, who was leading the column, was slightly wounded; later it was stated that it was a Sergeant.

It was announced that a summary investigation would be carried out by the Military Prosecutor. This investigation was never made known, and a judicial investigation into these events was never conducted.

According to the data from the Rettig Report, numerous deaths of opponents were justified in this way, and the aforementioned report notes: "Among these types of executions, the use of the so-called 'escape law' was frequent during the months following September 11, 1973.

The most common official explanations provided in these cases maintained that the uniformed personnel fired upon prisoners who were attempting to escape and who did not heed the order to halt, as a result of which they died." The report adds: "The Commission found that these explanations were implausible in all cases of the so-called 'escape law' that it examined, and therefore considered them to be executions outside of any process that were attempted to be justified with a false version of an escape." This Commission, when referring specifically to the Quillota massacre, declares: "It is not plausible that it was necessary to kill all those affected to prevent their alleged escape, since they were unarmed and under heavy military guard." "Several detainees had presented themselves voluntarily to the military authorities, so it does not seem coherent that they would attempt to flee. Some of them had even made contact with lawyers to be defended in the process that, according to what they had been told, would be initiated against them." "The alleged extremist attack would have occurred in a place that had heavy armed surveillance due to its strategic nature. It is also not plausible that an attack of such a nature could have been attempted during curfew hours and that none of the attackers were captured. For the same reason, it is not credible that the supposed fugitives were not found." The Rettig Report has indicated that "The Commission believes that Levy Arraño was also likely killed by the same people who carried out the execution of the persons mentioned previously, since he remained detained in the same military facility. It must be considered that one of those executed was Hugo Aranda Bruna, secretary of the San Isidro Peasant Committee, of which Arraño was the president, which suggests that the same motives existed for proceeding with his execution." A conscript who had the opportunity to see the scene of the events points out that the convoy consisted of a jeep and three military trucks. Only in the last one were there 8 soldiers, and it is probable that there were as many in the others. The military personnel who participated in this act were personnel from the Military Intelligence Service (SIM), supported by commandos. According to the information from this conscript, there were 33 detainees and all were executed. Many were peasants from San Isidro, San Pedro de Quillota, El Manzanar, La Tetera, Pueblo Indio, La Calera, La Cruz, Charrabata, El Melón, Nogales, Limache, and Boco. Since January 17, 1974, Levy Arraño has been forcibly disappeared.

Judicial and/or Administrative Proceedings

On July 12, 1990, Lidia Araya filed a complaint for "Presumed Misfortune" (Presunta Desgracia) on behalf of her spouse, Levy Segundo Arraño Sancho, in the First Criminal Court of Quillota. In this filing, Ms.

Araya maintains that "my spouse was detained in the Regiment until January 17, 1974, the date on which, according to the official version, he was released. However, my husband did not arrive at our home, nor has there been any news of his whereabouts." The document requests an investigation to determine his current whereabouts.

In relation to this case and others of forcibly disappeared persons, the 2nd Court of Quillota ordered an investigation into an illegal burial on the premises of the Quillota Cavalry School. On December 26, 1991, Judge Raúl Beltramí was prevented from entering the aforementioned military facility to conduct the corresponding investigations by Colonel Francisco Javier Pérez Egbert, Commander of said School, who argued before the Valparaíso Court of Appeals that the alleged crime is amnestied in accordance with Decree Law 2.191 of 1978 and that, if there were perpetrators, they would be favored by that Decree Law. Jurisdiction was also questioned. Regarding this investigation, the families of one of the forcibly disappeared persons from the Quillota Cavalry School, Rubén Cabezas Pares, filed a complaint for illegal burial. Following Commander Pérez's refusal to allow the judge to proceed with the exhumation, a trial for denial of aid to justice was initiated in the same Quillota Court. During the year 1992, the Supreme Court decided to consolidate both proceedings in the Military Prosecutor's Office of Valparaíso. That court decided to dismiss the case for denial of aid. Regarding the process for illegal burial, by the end of 1992, the plaintiff's side had not managed to make progress.

Source: Vicariate of Solidarity

The "assault on the patrol" case refers to a simulated extremist attack on January 17, 1974, which was in reality the execution of eight people and the subsequent disappearance of two of them. The extraordinary visiting minister of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Julio Miranda Lillo, handed down a sentence against several individuals involved in the so-called "Assault on the military patrol" case, which occurred in Quillota on January 17, 1974.

The magistrate determined sanctions for the perpetrators of the crimes of kidnapping with grave damage committed against Rubén Guillermo Cabezas Pares, Pablo Gac Espinoza, Levy Segundo Arraño Sancho, Víctor Enrique Fuenzalida Fuenzalida, Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez, Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna, Ángel Mario Díaz Castro, Osvaldo Mario Manzano Cortés, and Arturo Julio Loo Prado.

The sanctions are detailed below

• Angel Custodio Torres Rivera: 6 years, without benefits.
• Sergio Carlos Arredondo González: 6 years, without benefits.
• Francisco Javier Pérez Egert: 5 years. The benefit of supervised release was granted.
• Leonardo Quilodrán Burgos: 5 years. The benefit of supervised release was granted.
• Daniel Javier Walker Ramos: 3 years and one day. The benefit of supervised release was granted.
• Pedro Alberto Durcurdoy Montandón: acquitted for lack of participation.
• Raúl Aurelio Muñoz Gutiérrez: acquitted for lack of participation.
• Laureano Enrique Hernández Araya: acquitted for lack of participation.

Likewise, Minister Miranda Lillo determined to accept the civil claims filed and to condemn, jointly and severally, the State Treasury and the convicted individuals Ángel Custodio Torres Rivera, Sergio Carlos Arredondo González, Francisco Javier Pérez Egert, Daniel Javier Walker Ramos, and Leonardo Quilodrán Burgos to pay the plaintiffs who acted on behalf of the nine victims of this investigation the amount of nine hundred million pesos ($900,000,000), corresponding, consequently, to the figure of one hundred million pesos ($100,000,000) for each of the victims.

This is the second sentence handed down by Minister Miranda Lillo in cases of human rights violations under his charge. Assault on a military patrol case The "assault on the patrol" case refers to a simulated extremist attack on January 17, 1974, which was in reality the execution of eight people and the subsequent disappearance of two of them.

An official bulletin of the time reported that six prisoners died in a skirmish when extremist elements assaulted the patrol that was transporting them, under the command of the then-Captain Francisco Pérez Egart.

The other two prisoners, the former mayor of Quillota, Pablo Gac Espinoza, and the legal counsel of the CORA, Rubén Cabezas Parés, were taken to the Cavalry School. The military command's bulletin reported that both had escaped. October 29, 2008

Source: afepchile.cl 3/1/2009

Date: 03-01-2009

The then-Army captain Daniel Walker allegedly delivered the "coup de grâce" to a prisoner who remained alive. The bodies of the nine victims had been taken from the site of the massacre to the Engineers Regiment.

According to an officer who provided testimony, when Walker realized that one was still alive, he ordered him to be put into a jeep and taken to the place where they had staged the fake "assault on the patrol," and there, on a pile of dirt, he shot him to death.

Afterward, they returned to the Regiment with the corpse. To this day, it is not known which of the victims was so coldly finished off by the uniformed officer.

These and other chilling details are established—thanks to witness statements—in the voluminous file of Case Rol No. 35.738, which is being investigated by the visiting judge Gabriela Corti for kidnapping and qualified homicide, referring to the episode wrongly called the "assault on the patrol," which in the early hours of January 18, 1974, left nine leftist militants dead in Quillota.

The information flows from some thirty pages of the proceedings, a photocopy of which was provided to this media outlet by the son of one of the massacre victims.

On that occasion, the military authority carried out a setup to kill the nine leaders and later maintain that the detainees were being transported from the Engineers Regiment to the Cavalry School, and that on the way, the patrol had been assaulted by "extremist elements," leaving six prisoners dead.

The remaining three—the former socialist mayor Pablo Gac Espinoza, the lawyer and socialist leader Rubén Cabezas Parés, and the peasant leader Levi Arraño Sancho, of the MAPU—had allegedly escaped, according to the communiqué issued at the time.

Everything was planned

According to the information gathered during the two years of inquiries led by Judge Corti, the order to detain the militants and leftist leaders Manuel Hurtado, Hugo Aranda, Arturo Loo, Eduardo Manzano, Ángel Díaz, and Víctor Fuenzalida (some of whom were already in prison), along with Pablo Gac and Rubén Cabezas, was allegedly given by Colonel Sergio Arredondo González, who had been the operational chief of the "Caravan of Death"—which left a hundred dead throughout Chile—and who at the time was the director of the Cavalry School.

Levi Arraño had allegedly been detained since earlier at the same School.

The massacre was allegedly planned in advance, with the participation—even—of civilians, who advised the military and collaborated by supporting the actions.

The nine prisoners were concentrated on the night of January 17, 1974, at the Engineers Regiment, where the officers and non-commissioned officers summoned for those purposes also arrived. In charge of the entire operation was the then-captain Francisco Pérez Egert.

Some of the participants acknowledge that they were summoned "only to collaborate in the transfer" of the prisoners from one military unit to another.

Grenades and machine-gun bursts

What is established is that at the Regiment itself, the three detainees who would be declared fugitives were separated from the remaining six. Everyone left after midnight in a caravan of four vehicles that headed along Yungay to Freire and from there to the Camino a San Isidro, which leads to the Cavalry School.

But meters from the railway underpass, the caravan stopped and Captain Pérez ordered all the detainees to get out, handcuffed as they were, placing them to the side of the vehicles. On each side of the road, about 80 meters from the site, military personnel were positioned to prevent the passage of vehicles.

Behind the scene of the massacre, a civilian watched from the house on his plot of land, with the mission of notifying the Cavalry School as soon as it had concluded.

At Captain Pérez's order, the explosion of grenades and bursts of machine-gun fire directed at the nine prisoners began. It was a matter of a few seconds; enough to murder the nine leaders and set fire to one of the caravan's jeeps, with which they intended to make the massacre appear as an "extremist assault on the patrol" that was transporting detainees.

Removal of the bodies

Once the shooting ended, Captain Pérez ordered the bodies to be picked up and taken back to the Regiment. There, after realizing that one of the executed men remained alive, the then-captain Daniel Walker ordered him to be put into a military vehicle to personally transport him to the place where the setup was carried out.

There, he had him placed on a pile of dirt and allegedly fired the coup de grâce.

Once the corpse was returned to the Engineers Regiment, it was ordered that the bodies of the three who would be declared fugitives be taken to the Cavalry School, from where, before ten o'clock the following morning, they were removed by a Navy helicopter to be thrown into the sea off the coast of Quintero.

The remains of the other six murdered leaders were sent to the morgue of the Quillota Hospital, where doctors Jorge Abde (now deceased) and Orazio Bruzzone—who testified before the Judge—performed the autopsies. Subsequently, the corpses were handed over to the relatives in closed and sealed coffins by a funeral home chosen by the military themselves.

This entire procedure deviated absolutely and arbitrarily from those that correspond judicially, because the military removed the bodies without waiting for the forensic examinations by the Investigations police, which should have intervened immediately at the scene of the event.

Everyone denies their participation

From the parts of the file to which the victims' families and ZonaImpacto.cl had access, it flows that each of those involved and prosecuted in this case continues to systematically deny their participation, apparently respecting the already known "pact of silence." Colonel (ret.) Arredondo, who ordered the entire operation, claims to have arrived just that early morning, unaware of everything that had happened.

The then-captain Walker says he had no knowledge of what happened, as does his colleague Pedro Durcodoy, while Captain Pérez Egert also claims to have been passing by the place casually when he was surprised by the explosion of a grenade, which caused his vehicle to go off the road and caused him a traumatic brain injury and serious injuries to an arm.

He lost consciousness—he maintains—and therefore knows nothing of what occurred.

However, Judge Corti has obtained overwhelming evidence that allowed her to establish participation "as authors" of kidnappings and qualified homicides by the seven former military personnel and one former carabineer whom she indicted last July.

They are the retired colonels Sergio Arredondo, Francisco Pérez, Pedro Durcodoy, and Daniel Walker; the retired major Raúl Muñoz; the senior non-commissioned officers Leonardo Quilodrán and Sergio Placencia, all from the Army; and the retired senior non-commissioned officer of the Carabineros Laureano Hernández.

With the exception of Colonel Arredondo, all those prosecuted obtained release on bail.

Thirty years later

As yesterday marked thirty years since the massacre that shocked—until now—life in the peaceful city of Quillota, the victims' families expressed themselves as very distressed after learning the details of what happened, but also somewhat relieved because they perceive that the diligent work of the Visiting Judge is managing to get decisively closer to establishing the whole truth, which will allow those responsible to be sanctioned.

Yesterday, Sunday, the day of the thirtieth anniversary of this cruel slaughter, the relatives and human rights organizations of Quillota remembered the date with an audiovisual exhibition next to the Monument to the Victims of Human Rights Violations, in the Plaza de Armas, and then a "candlelight vigil" in the same place.

Surprising encounter between the son of the murdered former Mayor and two of those prosecuted as authors of crimes

On the morning of last Wednesday, January 14, the teacher Pedro Pablo Gac went to a commercial establishment in Quillota to photocopy part of the file on the homicides of his father—the former mayor Pablo Gac—and eight other leftist militants, perpetrated on January 18, 1974.

He had promised to deliver said photocopy to this journalist for the writing of reports for this and other media outlets, on the occasion of the thirtieth anniversary of the massacre.

During the previous night and early morning, he had read the pages of the summary again and again, and he was still shocked by the chilling details described therein.

While a clerk at the business was making his photocopies, he noticed with unusual surprise that at another machine, the official in charge was photocopying identical writings and parts of the same file.

After hesitating for a few minutes, he asked the customers who were carrying those documents who they were.

Moments later, still excited by the unusual encounter and in the calm of a café table, he tried to recover from the impression and organize his ideas.

"It was a short guy, with a mustache, about 65 years old, and another taller one, somewhat younger," he told ZonaImpacto.cl. "I asked them who they were and they introduced themselves, shaking my hand: one was the retired Army non-commissioned officer Sergio Placencia and the other, retired Carabineros non-commissioned officer Laureano Hernández."

Two of those prosecuted as authors of the qualified kidnapping of his father, whose status as forcibly disappeared still remains. They are also prosecuted for the kidnapping of Rubén Cabezas and Levi Arraño, along with the homicide of six other leftist militants.

They deny everything, everything...

Pedro Pablo Gac was extremely impressed by the attitude of the two defendants.

• They looked haggard, diminished. Nothing reflects in them the arrogant and overbearing subjects of before, those who detained and tortured, as I understand it.

Did you know them from before?

• Not at all. I had heard about them and seen their names in the indictment. Nothing more.

Did they appear humble?

• I would say so, although they were rather extremely kind to me. They told me about the functions they claim to have performed at the time of the massacre and assured me that they had absolutely nothing to do with the crimes.

What explanation do they have?

• I don't know, I didn't retain much, I was very impressed and I also confess that I didn't believe what they were saying.

Didn't they seem sincere to you?

• In reality, they tried hard to seem so; they told me that they were at my disposal, that they would like to talk again... but Judge Corti has investigated meticulously for two years, has been connecting the dots, and prosecuted them as authors. I have no doubts about the Magistrate's work, so I must suspect that they are not telling the truth.

Did they ask you for forgiveness?

• No! If they claim they are innocent! So the only thing they did was justify themselves, argue that they had no participation, and put themselves at the disposal of us, the relatives, to "help us" discover the truth.

But they must know it...

• They maintain that they know nothing of what happened, that it never occurred to them to find out, that they didn't hear anything, that it was not their job to investigate.

Don't they even acknowledge having had collateral participation?

• Former carabineer Hernández says he only acted as a driver in several detentions, but he doesn't know who the detainees were and doesn't remember the names of the captors.

What feeling remains with you after this experience?

• That they are cowardly people who do not want to assume their responsibilities and are not willing to pay with prison for their participation in the very serious crimes in which they participated. I believe they were convinced that the hand of justice would never fall upon them, and I fear that thirty years ago someone—or more than someone—must have guaranteed them total and eternal impunity. It gives the impression that now they feel bewildered, fearful, and abandoned. I was left with the feeling that they are afraid... very afraid.

Process established participation of civilians in the planning of the homicides

An indeterminate number of civilians participated in the planning and execution of the homicides perpetrated by the military on January 18, 1974.

The file records interrogations of several of them, both in Chile and abroad; the former conducted directly by the investigating Judge and the others by personnel of the Fifth Department of Investigations.

The parts of the summary known to ZonaImpacto.cl demonstrate not only the meticulous and tireless work carried out by Magistrate Gabriela Corti but also by the civil police officers, who did not leave any investigative step unfulfilled.

Civilians

An Army non-commissioned officer, in his testimony, mentions the agricultural businessman Claudio Monreal Navarro, maintaining that "this person was an 'aide' to the Army, who witnessed these events; furthermore, he himself commented to me that he was aware in advance of the planning of how the 'assault on the patrol' was going to occur; they prepared him for this and it was his job to make the phone call to the Cavalry School to report what happened, just as he facilitated vehicles and even coordinated with the funeral home that transported the deceased.

This is an elderly person and he has indicated to me that he is willing to collaborate, but he is scared."

Apparently, he had to overcome his fear, because he finally testified as a witness, as did Osvaldo "Guatón" Romo and Ismael Villavicencio Carrasco.

The same non-commissioned officer says he gathered a series of facts about this episode, "finding out that it was not an assault but a 'show' carried out by military comrades of that time to eliminate a series of political people opposed to the military government, simulating a confrontation between a military patrol that was transporting political detainees and subversive elements."

He also mentions names of other military personnel who participated: Eladio Lara Valenzuela, René Olivares Faúndez, Carlos Retamal Salazar, René Gutiérrez Herrera. Also a carabineer: Orlando Tapia Tapia.

General Juan Arenas Franco, meanwhile, mentions a certain "Pepe" as another of the military's aides: "The only thing I remember from that night (the night of the massacre) is that I was on patrol accompanied by a civilian named Pepe, who was the owner of a plot of land located in front of the Cavalry School, who facilitated his pickup truck for these types of duties."

Did the dinner of informers exist?

Upon learning these details, along with the demonstration that the slaughter of Quillota leaders was coldly planned, the denunciation made some years ago by Pablo Cabezas Salamanca, son of the lawyer Rubén Cabezas, gains strength.

Pablo Cabezas claimed to have knowledge of a "social" dinner that took place days before this episode, shortly after the arrival of the then-lieutenant colonel as Director of the Cavalry School.

The new military chief had allegedly selected a group of civilians who were businessmen—especially farmers—and right-wing political leaders or wealthy people who had harbored hatred toward the people of the overthrown Popular Unity.

On that occasion, the attendees had allegedly drawn up for Arredondo a fateful list of the "most dangerous" leftist political leaders in the area.

That would have been the death sentence for nine prominent social leaders of the city.

There are many names circulating about the attendees of this "social" meeting, but the versions highlight that of a farmer who was a high executive of a state company during the Pinochet regime.

Other forcibly disappeared

In all the interrogations of military personnel, Magistrate Corti did not fail to ask them if they knew the fate of two forcibly disappeared persons whose final whereabouts she wishes to establish.

Invariably, all those interrogated claim to have no idea and to have never heard those names before.

They are Jorge Eduardo Villarroel Vilches, from Limache, then a leader of MOPARE (an organization affiliated with Salvador Allende's government), who was detained on April 19, 1974, when he presented himself at the San Pedro Carabineros Station, where he had been summoned.

The second disappeared person is Bernardino Rodríguez Cortez, a saddler who lived in Cerro Mayaca, a militant of the Communist Party, detained on March 6, 1974, inside a leather shop on O'Higgins Street in Quillota. The detention was carried out by Quillota Investigations officials, among whom were sub-inspector Omar Mercado and detectives Juan González and Hugo Olivari.

Former military governor

It has drawn attention that the then-Governor, Military Chief of Quillota, and commander of the Engineers Regiment, Ángel Custodio Torres, has not testified nor was he prosecuted. The authority may not have participated directly, but at the very least he would be an accessory, since he signed the communiqué deceiving the community with the version of the extremist assault.

The parts of the file known to this media outlet do not shed full light on the detail, but sources close to the process assured us that the former governor is affected by total dementia. In the file, there is a medical certificate that accuses partial memory loss due to his pronounced alcoholism.

Placencia's confusions

A curiosity of the process is the initial statement by senior non-commissioned officer (ret.) Sergio Placencia to the effect that the former captain Daniel Walker gave the "coup de grâce" to one of the victims who did not die instantly.

But when both were confronted, doubt entered Placencia's mind: "I maintain what was previously stated regarding the wounded man in the patrol assault who was subsequently finished off by an officer on the International Road.

But now, seeing my Major Walker, I cannot specify with certainty that this was said officer, maintaining in this regard the doubts I expressed previously; that is, whether it was him or it was Jaime Bachler..."

But then, faced with this latter officer, he again "gets confused": "I maintain my previous statements. Now that I have Officer Bachler in front of me, I cannot say that this was the officer who finished off the wounded man. I insist the doubt persists whether it was him or Major Walker, and to clear up said doubt, I refer to the confrontation that was carried out with the latter."

Source: January 21, 2004 Zonaimpacto.cl

Date: 01-21-2004

Chilling details of the 1974 massacre in Quillota

One of the six executed in the setup staged by Army personnel on January 18, 1974, did not die immediately at the site of the massacre but was transported along with the five corpses of his companions to the Engineers Regiment, where he arrived dead.

The bodies were handed over to their relatives in coffins tied with barbed wire, and they were forced to bury them in consecutive niches in the El Mayaca Cemetery, where they remained guarded by armed soldiers, who for some time prevented the mourners from approaching even to leave flowers...

Those are some of the chilling details contained in the Resolution issued by Judge Gabriela Corti when indicting eight retired uniformed officers as authors of the crimes of qualified homicide of six leftist militants and the repeated qualified kidnapping of three political leaders: the former mayor Pablo Gac Espinoza (PS), the lawyer and socialist leader Rubén Cabezas Parés, and the peasant leader, MAPU militant, Levi Arraño Sánchez.

Judge Corti went to the Second Criminal Court of Quillota to notify the plaintiff lawyers about the indictments issued last Saturday against eight former uniformed officers implicated in the slaughter. Originally, there was talk of ten prosecuted, because the judge only notified them one by one, sending them detained to Army and Carabineros units, but the names or charges were not made public.

Visiting Judge

The judge of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Gabriela Corti, no longer has the status of a Special Jurisdiction Judge for this case, because with the former dictator and former senator-for-life Augusto Pinochet being definitively dismissed, there is no defendant or accused with special immunity (in this case, parliamentary).

In such circumstances, and as a Visiting Judge, Judge Corti set the Second Criminal Court of Quillota as the seat for her work, where the first complaints and lawsuits regarding this case were filed.

On this occasion, Judge Gabriela Corti met with all the lawyers sponsoring the various lawsuits accumulated in her investigation: Héctor Salazar, Hugo Gutiérrez, Nelson Caucoto, Julia Urquieta, and Hiram Villagra. They were joined yesterday by the Quillota lawyer Elmita Puebla, who sponsored the first lawsuits immediately after the events occurred, and the CODEPU attorney, Federico Aguirre.

The prosecuted

The indictment, of only six pages—a document of at least 15 was expected—does not abound in details about the facts established by the magistrate, limiting itself to a brief summary that, nevertheless, allows confirming many of the suspicions and information that both the victims' families and this journalist handled.

After the detail of the statements, confrontations, reports, and documents viewed, she indicts Sergio Carlos Arredondo González (lieutenant colonel and director of the Cavalry School in 1974; he had arrived at the end of 1973 after having participated as an operational officer in the Caravan of Death), Francisco Javier Pérez Egert (then-captain, personally directed the "operations" to murder the nine victims), Pedro Alberto Durcudoy Montandón, Daniel Javier Walker Ramos (both officers of the Cavalry School, with direct participation in the murders), Leonardo Quilodrán Burgos (non-commissioned officer, one of the cruelest repressors the area knew), Sergio Placencia Sepúlveda (non-commissioned officer, specialized in "intelligence," participated in the planning and detentions), Raúl Aurelio Muñoz Gutiérrez (Army non-commissioned officer, participated actively), and Laureano Enrique Hernández Araya (Carabineros non-commissioned officer, also characterized by the cruelty of his repressive actions).

The document details that the aforementioned former uniformed officers are charged "as authors of the crime of qualified homicide in a repeated nature, of Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna, Julio Arturo Loo Pardo, Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez, Eduardo Manzano Cortés, Ángel Mario Díaz Castro, and Víctor Enrique Fuenzalida Fuenzalida, provided for and sanctioned in Art. 391 of the Penal Code, and as authors of the crime of qualified kidnapping, in a repeated nature, of Pablo Gac Espinoza, Rubén Guillermo Cabezas Parés, and Levi Segundo Arraño Sancho, provided for and sanctioned in Art. 141, Paragraph 4 of the same Code."

In a first reading, the paragraphs described above make it clear that the six crimes perpetrated at the San Isidro underpass and the three executions committed inside the Cavalry School, from where the remains were made to disappear, were committed by the same uniformed officers.

Interrogations and confrontations

During her nearly two years of inquiries, Judge Corti interrogated more than thirty witnesses, defendants, suspects, accused, and relatives of the victims, many of whom are named in the indictment.

Great responsibility for the success of the inquiries lies with the Investigations detectives, both from the Fifth Department and Interpol. While the former were in charge of a huge number of investigative steps in the country, the latter located and interrogated witnesses in various cities in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

The participation of some of those prosecuted was until now unknown to the victims' families, such as officers Pedro Durcudoy and Daniel Walker and non-commissioned officer Raúl Muñoz.

Also, several of the people who provided statements both in the country and abroad are unknown to the relatives. Such are the cases of the retired Army officer Mario René del Carmen Díaz Pérez, interrogated by Interpol in the United States, and Ángel Rafael Muñoz Pavez, interrogated in Amsterdam, Holland, whose statement remained protected in a separate volume of the main file.

Also unknown is the relationship of Marcelino Bugeño Bugueño, Segundo Aladino Jofré Morales, Ismael Enrique Villavicencio Carrasco, and José Arnoldo Escobar Ojeda, all declarants in the process, some of whom are allegedly military personnel. Like Carlos Varas Frederick, who was an officer at the Cavalry School, where he stood out as an equestrian.

On page 572 is the statement of the civilian Osvaldo Romo Mena, a former leftist militant who became one of the cruelest torturers in the operations and detention centers in Santiago, but whose relationship with the events in Quillota was unknown until now.

Brief account of the facts

The account of the facts established by the judicial investigation is brief in the document that prosecutes the eight former uniformed officers. For this reason, the plaintiff lawyers requested the Visiting Judge to have access to the summary, which they will only be able to do starting this Friday; that is, one day after the deadline for the defendants to appeal or file any legal recourse expires.

However, omitting some information, it reveals chilling details about what happened in the early hours of January 18, 1974.

The document specifies that based on the information, interrogations, confrontations, and reports accumulated, "it can be established" that on January 17, 1974, "military personnel took six people out of the Quillota Public Jail, union leaders, all leftist militants or sympathizers, who were led by them to the Engineers Regiment No. 2 'Aconcagua' of said city, where they remained detained; a place to which that same day three others also presented themselves voluntarily, also leftist militants, following a summons made to them at their homes and workplaces by military personnel, this time dressed in civilian clothes, also remaining detained, the latter being the Mayor of the city, the Prosecutor of the Agrarian Reform Corporation (CORA) based in the city of Quillota, and the president of the Peasant Committee of the San Isidro sector." The latter are Pablo Gac, Rubén Cabezas, and Levi Arraño, respectively.

"It could be called an ambush"

The account of the established facts continues by pointing out that in the last hours of the 17th or the first hours of January 18, 1974, all the detainees were put into vehicles that, "in the number of four and heavily guarded by a military contingent, would transport them to the Armored Cavalry School of Quillota, which said military column did not reach."

The trajectory was interrupted, according to the document, "due to the fact that as it crossed the underpass called San Isidro, in what could be called an ambush since 'grenade explosions' and 'machine-gun bursts' occurred from both sides of the underpass, which reached the vehicles that composed it," it was verified later that one of the jeeps had caught fire.

Likewise, it was verified that "of the military contingent, only one resulted with an injury whose nature was not accredited."

Indeed, we recall that Captain Pérez Egert appeared with a bandaged hand and it was reported that he was the only soldier wounded in the "extremist assault" and "intense skirmish with terrorists."

One detainee did not die immediately

The account contained in the judicial Resolution adds that after the explosion of grenades and machine-gun bursts, however, among the detainees, "one of them was wounded and five were deceased as a consequence of the multiple injuries caused to their bodies by projectiles" (the words in bold have been highlighted as such in the judicial document).

In Quillota, it was learned days later that the autopsy protocols—performed by doctors Oracio Bruzzone and Jorge Abde—established that all presented dozens of bullet impacts fired from behind.

The Resolution of the indictments details that after the attack with heavy fire from the military against the unarmed and handcuffed civilians, the bodies of the five murdered and the wounded man "were taken back in the same vehicles toward the Regiment from which they had left moments before, a place from which all were transported by military personnel toward the local morgue, because the detainee who remained wounded had also died."

It is not detailed in what circumstances the sixth victim died, who could have been finished off with a coup de grâce or have died on the way from bleeding or the effects of the projectiles.

It is pointed out below that all these victims were handed over by the Military Governor (Colonel Ángel Torres) to their relatives "in closed coffins tied with barbed wire, leaving the face of each of them exposed for their recognition, which were then buried in contiguous niches in the local Cemetery, said niches remaining open for a space of two or three days, always guarded by military personnel, for the purpose that the relatives could obtain authorization from the Governorate for their burial in family vaults."

All of the above, according to the Magistrate, "constitutes the crime of qualified homicide, in a repeated nature" of the six leftist militants already listed.

Three forcibly disappeared

Regarding the forcibly disappeared, the document states that "the other three detainees, Pablo Gac Espinoza, Rubén Cabezas Parés, and Levi Arraño Sancho, were seen there—San Isidro underpass—for the last time, a situation that persists until today, so, their current whereabouts being unknown, it is established that their detention has been prolonged for more than fifteen days, thus constituting the crime of qualified kidnapping, in a repeated nature."

Source: July 18, 2003 Zonaimpacto.cl

Date: 07-18-2003

Quillota Case: Conscripts reveal burials of the forcibly disappeared

When the judge of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Gabriela Corti, receives the file of the case known as the "Quillota slaughter" in the coming days, she will find important progress, as the testimonies of two former Army conscripts are contained in the secret volumes of the process, revealing that three forcibly disappeared persons were murdered and illegally buried inside the Infantry School on January 18, 1974, and confirming the participation in their kidnapping of a series of retired officers.

The conscripts, whose identity is kept in the strictest reserve, declared that the events that culminated in the death of the mayor of Quillota, Pablo Gac (PS), the peasant leader Levi Segundo Arraño (PS), and the Mapu militant and Cora prosecutor, Rubén Cabeza Pares, occurred near 12:00 hours that day. Likewise, they attest that the remains were buried in the same military compound.

However, the report that the Armed Forces delivered as a conclusion of the Dialogue Table establishes that these people were thrown into the sea off the coast of Con Con, so the magistrate will have to clarify if their remains were removed subsequently.

The testimonies of these two key witnesses, and the interrogation of the victims' families, hold responsible for their qualified kidnapping—the crime under which the process is labeled—the former Commander of the Garrison and Director of the Cavalry School, Fernando Paredes, who until December 1973 served as governor for the area.

Likewise, they incriminate the former commander of the School, Angel Custodio Torres Rivera, who then held the rank of colonel and served as Chief of Intelligence; the patrol commander, Captain Francisco Pérez Egert; and the lieutenant colonel (ret.) Sergio Arredondo, prosecuted as one of the main defendants in the Caravan of Death case.

Judicial sources confirmed that these military personnel could be prosecuted in their capacity as accessories for the command responsibility they had at the moment the detentions occurred. They clarify that in this case, the figure of qualified kidnapping again gains validity and directly affects Arredondo, who, upon arriving in the area, immediately requested that the detainees be transferred to the School.

Judge Corti will have to assume the investigation of the case, after the period in which the special jurisdiction judge Juan Guzmán was on medical leave, his substitute, Gabriela Pérez, determined that it be seen by a court in the Fifth Region, declaring herself incompetent and handing over the information to its jurisdiction.

Although this news was not well received at first by the victims' families, the plaintiff lawyers Julia Urquieta and Héctor Salazar pointed out that the investigation has greater possibilities of advancing in the hands of a judge who is less saturated with cases and recognized that the inquiries will allow the prompt issuance of the first indictments.

For lawyer Héctor Salazar, representative of Rubén Cabeza's family, only Judge Corti's investigation will determine the truth of this new information, although he does not rule out that the detainees were buried in the Quillota Cavalry School and subsequently removed and thrown into the sea.

Different is the opinion of lawyer Julia Urquieta, who is categorical when ruling out that the bodies of the three forcibly disappeared persons are on the seabed. She maintains that the information gathered by Judge Guzmán and that provided by a series of witnesses makes it evident that these people were shot in the military compound and their bodies have always remained there.

Along with these three disappearances, the process investigates the executions of six other people inside the Infantry School, whose remains were handed over to their families with evidence of having been subjected to illegal duress during their detention.

Inside the Cavalry regiment, the head of the Cora Technical Department, Víctor Fuenzalida Fuenzalida; the Treasury employee Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez; the textile workers Osvaldo Mario Manzano Cortés and Julio Arturo Loo Prado; and the community leaders Ángel Mario Díaz Castro and Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna were executed.

Quillota in the hands of the military

The plaintiffs explain that after the Coup d'État, Quillota remained under the tutelage of the Commander of the Garrison and Director of the Cavalry School, Colonel Fernando Paredes Pizarro. As in other areas of the country, the detainees presented themselves voluntarily to the police stations, after hearing the military communiqués that ordered them to do so.

In the case of Pablo Gac, the reconstruction of the events indicates that "he signed periodically at the Military Prosecutor's Office of Quillota. His home was raided on September 15 and he was detained for 24 hours in Investigations.

He was regularly summoned for interrogations both to the Governorate and to the Infantry Regiment, until on January 17, plainclothes personnel went to look for him at his home for a new interrogation."

A witness who was detained in the military compound declares that he saw him descend from a military vehicle along with Rubén Cabezas Pares, who was deprived of liberty at his workplace that same afternoon.

Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna, 30 years old, a farmer, worked along with Levi Arraño on Plot No. 29 of San Isidro. Both were summoned on several occasions to provide statements both to the Governorate and to Investigations. But it is not until after January 11, 1974, that they were detained. The former was taken to the Quillota Jail and the latter to the regiment.

Arraño is not mentioned in the official version of the crimes committed on January 18, and his wife was informed that he was released on the afternoon of January 17. However, a uniformed officer declared that he saw him that day inside the regiment and he was left along with Pablo Gac and Rubén Cabezas.

The rest of the victims were summoned to the regional governorate and were detained immediately. In this group were Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez (PS), an employee of the Quillota Treasury; Julio Arturo Loo Prado (PC), a textile worker; Víctor Enrique Fuenzalida Fuenzalida (PC), head of the CORA Technical Department; Osvaldo Mario Manzano Cortés (FTR), a textile worker; and Ángel Mario Díaz Castro (FTR), a community leader.

The group was transferred to the Quillota Public Jail by order of the Second Department that operated in the local Governorate. Unconfirmed information indicates that at the beginning of October, they were left in the hands of the Gendarmerie and were transferred to the "Silva Palma" naval facility, but the excessive number of prisoners forced them to be transferred to the ship "Lebu," hold No. 3, under the charge of the Navy.

The military chief of the time and Governor of Quillota, Ángel C. Torres Rivera, reported that in the early hours of January 18, 1974, "extremist elements surprisingly attacked the Military Patrol of the Cavalry School that was carrying detainees from the Engineers Battalion to that compound.

Faced with this emergency, the Patrol repelled the attack and in the midst of the confusion, Pablo Gac and Rubén Cabezas fled. As a consequence of the confrontation, the following detainees, who also tried to escape, were discharged: Hugo Hernán Aranda Bruna, Julio Arturo Loo Pardo, Eduardo Manzano Cortes, Víctor Enrique Fuenzalida, Ángel Mario Díaz Castro, Manuel Hernán Hurtado Martínez."

This military governor ordered the corresponding summary investigation by the Military Prosecutor, but his version is categorically denied in other testimonies attached to the process. Thus, Eva Hurtado, daughter of Manuel Hurtado, declared that an official document delivered in replacement of the autopsy protocol indicates that her father "died from multiple bullet wounds while trying to escape."

But this version contrasts with that of a witness who saw in the local morgue the body of Manuel Hurtado himself with bullet impacts to the forehead and exposed brain matter, which demonstrate that he was shot at close range.

His hands were still tied with wire. The family of another executed person, who prefers not to be identified, points out that in the case of their relative, he was throat-slit and was missing the nails from his hands and feet.

For the plaintiffs, this information makes it evident that after September 11, 1973, personnel from the intelligence services assumed the direction of the Cavalry School. For unknown reasons, Ángel Custodio Torres agreed that an officer of lower rank, Lieutenant Colonel (ret.) Sergio Arredondo, would take charge of the nine mentioned detainees.

This is explained because Sergio Arellano Stark, General Pinochet's delegate, had allegedly entrusted Arredondo to travel to the area to "expedite processes." The hypothesis has not yet been confirmed, but the plaintiffs will ask Judge Corti to investigate it. They add that the information they handle confirms that Arredondo ordered Pérez Egert to execute his strategy.

Source: Primera Linea August 20, 2001

Date: 08-20-2001