On April 3, 1976, Luis MUÑOZ VELASQUEZ, former Secretary of the San Bernardo Section of the PS and candidate for Councilman; Juan Humberto HERNANDEZ ZASPE, former President of the Federation of Industrial and Technical Students (FEITECH); and Manuel Jesús TAMAYO MARTINEZ, a sociologist and socialist leader who worked closely with members of his party's Central Committee, acting as a "liaison" between Carlos Lorca, Ricardo Lagos—also forcibly disappeared—and another socialist faction, were detained along with other Chileans on a public street in Mendoza.

The three were friends and had arrived in Argentina during 1974, leaving Chile where they were being persecuted for political reasons. They worked together at the "Modernflood" company in Mendoza and were in charge of reorganizing a Socialist Coordinating Committee, participating in activities of the so-called PS Consensus Commission.

According to several eyewitnesses, the military operation involved joint forces from the Argentine Federal Police and DINA agents. There is testimony that the three detainees were transported by land from Mendoza to Villa Grimaldi at the end of April 1976.

The Commission estimates that the three socialist detainees were forcibly disappeared while in the power of their captors, DINA agents, in Chile, in violation of their human rights.

Source: (Rettig Report)

Luis Muñoz was born in Santiago on August 11, 1948, at the Puente Alto Relief House. Together with his parents—Federico and María—and his ten siblings, he lived in the Maipo, Papelera, and Viñas Unidas neighborhoods, all located in Puente Alto.

As a young man, while standing out as a player for the Deportivo Mataquito team, he became linked to the PS in the Puente Alto Section, where he was noted for his active militancy in the high school student movement of that commune.

In 1968, he was elected president of the Student Center of the Consolidated Industrial School. After his family moved to San Bernardo, and upon enrolling in the Commercial High School of that commune, his natural leadership skills soon allowed him to be elected president of the Student Center of that institution.

It was in this new commune that Luis would develop an intense militant trajectory: In 1970, he was elected Political Secretary of the Socialist Youth in San Bernardo, and a year later, a candidate for councilman for the 1971 municipal elections.

Extroverted, athletic, and participatory, his personality earned him great popularity, which, combined with his militant commitment, led him to assume the position of Political Secretary of the PS in that section in 1972, at just 22 years of age.

After graduating from the commercial institute, he began working as an accountant at the National Institute for Agricultural Development (INDAP) and as a philosophy teacher at a night school in San Bernardo.

These were not his only activities: tireless, he enrolled in the History program at the UTE and actively collaborated in the party work of the agrarian and neighborhood front in San Bernardo, which at the time had significant rural sectors and newly established settlements.

Just one day after the coup, a military patrol detained him along with his brother and other neighbors from the "El Olivo" neighborhood in San Bernardo. After five days of illegal detention, he was released at the Maipo Bridge in that same commune.

He became involved in party reconstruction early on and began to be sought by agents of the dictatorship. On October 12, 1975, he was arrested along with his brother at his home by personnel from the Air Force Intelligence Service, remaining in detention for a week.

His sister was also detained and brought before him while he was being brutally interrogated about his activities and his militancy. After being released, his home remained under constant surveillance.

Aware of this harassment, he chose to travel to Argentina, a decision also shared by his friends Juan Hernández and Manuel Tamayo. He shared with them not only a friendship but also a precarious security situation in Chile, which made it advisable, at different times, for all of them to move to the neighboring country.

On December 22, 1975, he traveled to the city of Posadas, Misiones Province, to visit his mother, who was ill in that city. He then moved to Mendoza, where he settled. Luis was linked to the Commission for Consensus, one of the groups in which the PS militancy was articulated after the coup, and in Argentina, he had the mission of channeling economic resources to send to Chile and support the activity of that structure.

The Stalking of the Condor His plans were interrupted, however, by the repressive action that the intelligence services of Chile and Argentina had begun to coordinate through Operation Condor: By the end of 1975, Luis had been included in the List of Dangerous Persons drawn up by the DINA, a list that was in the hands of all the secret police and repressive agencies of the Southern Cone.

On April 3, 1976, Luis and his two friends were detained in a joint operation between Argentine Federal Police forces and DINA agents. The kidnappers took them to the Maipo Regiment in Mendoza, and that same night, they were transported to Chile in a van that took them first to the Cuatro Álamos torture camp, and the next morning, to the facility known as Villa Grimaldi, in Peñalolén.

Detained in Villa Grimaldi Juan Feres Nazarala, a MAPU militant, was detained on April 15, 1976, by DINA agents and taken to Villa Grimaldi, where he remained blindfolded almost the entire time. At that facility, he learned of other detainees, among whom were three socialist militants who had been kidnapped recently in Mendoza.

They were Luis Muñoz, Manuel Tamayo, and Juan Hernández. Feres was able to speak with Luis, with whom he was in the same cell, although not sharing the same space, as there was a separation with wooden partitions between them.

Luis confirmed to him that Manuel and Juan were also at Villa Grimaldi. He commented that he was in terrible conditions, that he had been tortured, and that he had been kidnapped in Mendoza along with his two companions and transported to Chile, handcuffed and hidden in the back of a truck.

In those brief conversations, he recounted that at the Argentine and Chilean border crossings, the police made jokes regarding the "cargo" the vehicle was carrying. They exchanged personal data and references of their respective families, in case either of them regained their freedom.

The MAPU member managed to be released, handing the data to lawyer Jaime Castillo Velasco, who in turn gave them to Luis's relatives. According to various testimonies, Luis was later taken to the extermination barracks on Simón Bolívar Street, and from there to the Fifth Region, to the Los Molles sector, from where he was allegedly thrown into the sea.

At the time of his detention, Luis was 26 years old. Audacity, Rebellion, and Romances: My Friend Luis Muñoz Velásquez "You're all sweaty again!"... This was a fairly daily exclamation from María, Luis's mother, the same woman who died with the anguish of not knowing the whereabouts of her son, one of those who—unintentionally—was assigned the designation of "forcibly disappeared." To remember Luis is also to remember that his heartbeats and his sweat had different motivations.

To visualize his figure is to reunite with a passionate young man, an athlete convinced of the importance of winning a soccer match, of climbing through one of the windows of his girlfriends' rooms to provide the appropriate warmth to those longings to make this atmosphere a space where happiness could also be universal.

In this dimension, and inserted into a roaring, effervescent, and expectant world, it was not strange to find Luis organizing activities for the development of the capabilities of the dispossessed. His insertion into social struggles sharpened his degree of commitment.

In this, he involved his family and his friends. His indignation at injustice and inequality began from the very moment he inhabited María's womb, when he insistently kicked, demanding his right to be born promptly.

Reluctantly, he cooperated with Federico, his father, whose performance and self-denial in caring for and maintaining that gigantic family had earned him the title of tireless warrior who, trowel in hand, fought the always harsh demands that economic life continued to impose on him, even after he retired.

In strict terms, my friend felt that his main motive in life was the achievement of social change. Without a doubt, that is why social activism made him vibrate as much as feminine caresses. In both situations, the sweat became pleasant and did not prevent rebellion from finally being part of that daily life that would eventually become the reason for his existence and in which audacity would emerge as a consequence of that unlimited dedication.

Audacity, rebellion, and romances are basic characteristics that accompany the life of my comrade. Audacity, for example, to lead protest marches and face the fierce police fury. Rebellion at the heartbreaking vision of the barefoot, hungry, and sobbing child, which consequently leads him to run for councilman.

Romances, because for some reason that his women should explain, he belonged to everyone and to no one. I know it; I was an accomplice in it. Yes, I kept watch "in case someone comes." I could not write these lines if I failed to mention what happened specifically to Luis after the brutal coup onslaught and the serious attempt to give Chilean society a new seal that would never allow the popular experience to be repeated. "And where could Lucho be?" some common friends would comment in low voices.

As expected, he began his furtive work. The idea was to reorganize a decimated Socialist Party. But the repression intensified. A repression that also raged against the self-sacrificing and never recognized, those of little fame, those with a slow and tired walk, like the Gonzálezes, the Hernándezes, the Valdéses, the Muñozezes, and like all those who constitute part of the base that did not falter.

Suddenly, the living room of Federico's house would soon be "occupied" by soldiers led by a black beret. We were sweating. The next day, I found him at a baby soccer match in some sector near Los Morros Avenue, over in San Bernardo.

Perhaps he already longed strongly for the presence of María, who had already crossed the mountain range of the Andes. But Luis's figure also represents the soft caresses of the libertarian breeze that crossed the faces not of dreamers, but of those who, in their boldness, are capable of giving a vital meaning—as a passion—to their existence, which does not neglect a good dose of sublimity.

That giving everything for one's neighbor, with a perspective of social justice here and now. That giving of oneself that leads him to legitimize in all its splendor the concept of consistency, constitutes an integral and vital part of Lucho's existence, but he should not be remembered only for that.

That was my friend. That is my comrade. It has been pleasant to bring you to the present once more. However, my pen and my being continue to ask: Where should I take the red carnations that we once observed?

What paths must I travel? What tunnel or abandoned mine must I search? How much will I have to sweat to get to see, at least, the trial and the punishment? "Sleep, sleep, little black boy"... is often heard through the skies of San Bernardo and Puente Alto, a song that also traverses Chile and other neighboring countries and that bounces off the search for the hope of a world in which human nobility overcomes the desire for profit and exploitation has no place.

Testimony of Héctor Fuentes Mancilla, teacher, socialist militant.

Source: pschile.cl

Honorable judges: we will now describe what happened to three Chilean citizens, members of the Socialist Party of that country.

Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe, a 23-year-old Chilean at the time of the events, had been a member of the Socialist Party from a very young age. He was president of the Federation of Secondary Students (FEITECH) and, as a representative, traveled to different regions and countries.

Following the 1973 coup d'état in Chile, the leadership of the Socialist Youth went underground. After the detention of a large number of them in September 1975, Hernández Zaspe left the country to ensure his safety. He settled in the Argentine city of Mendoza, where he reunited with two of his party comrades, Manuel Jesús Tamayo Martínez and Luis Gonzalo Muñoz Velásquez.

Manuel Jesús Tamayo Martínez had also been a member of the Socialist Party since his youth. In their neighborhood, he met Hernández Zaspe, with whom he formed a deep friendship, as they were not only neighbors but also shared political affinities.

Due to the establishment of the dictatorial regime, both he and his family suffered intense persecution, which led him to go into exile in Argentina at the beginning of 1976. He planned to continue his journey to Ecuador but settled first in the city of Mendoza.

Luis Gonzalo Muñoz Velázquez belonged to a family with strong ties to the Socialist Party. After the coup d'état, many of them were persecuted, suffered raids, and were imprisoned by the dictatorship, which forced them to leave their country.

As refugees, they initially settled in Argentina. Luis, who was detained in Chile for a brief period in 1975, initially fled to the city of Posadas, in the Misiones province, where his parents were also staying, but later, in the first months of 1976, he moved to Mendoza along with his brother Alex and his sister-in-law.

Unlike the rest of his family, he did not request refugee status from the UNHCR until he arrived in Mendoza, as he always maintained the intention of being able to return to his country.

In Mendoza, Hernández and Tamayo lived together in an apartment on Calle Belgrano, while Muñoz lived in another, on the same street, with his brother Alex, his sister-in-law, and another Chilean refugee, José Cerda.

With the goal of reorganizing the resistance and forming a coordinating committee for the Socialist Party, Hernández, Tamayo, and Muñoz continued their political activities from Mendoza, regrouping other compatriots who had also escaped the Chilean dictatorship.

Between December 1975 and January 1976, Hernández Zaspe traveled to Chile to visit his family. Once he returned to Mendoza, the DINA raided his family home in Chile on several occasions. Insistently, and despite knowing that he was in the city of Mendoza and continuing his political activity from there, they appeared demanding the presence of Juan Humberto, who planned to return to Chile for a visit in March; however, the pressure from the repressive forces stalking him once again thwarted his plans.

In Mendoza, they suffered similar pressure.

We must recall the particular harassment that Chilean citizens faced in that city from the local police, and that, furthermore, personnel from the Chilean DINA circulated permanently through the city streets, monitoring the movements of their compatriots.

This circumstance forced them to approach the local UNHCR office to request refugee status. There, they were told they should return on April 5, 1976, to continue the process, but they never arrived.

On April 3, 1976, Hernández Zaspe, Tamayo Martínez, and Muñoz Velázquez were kidnapped on a public street, on Calle Belgrano in the Argentine city of Mendoza. This city, as we know, was within the jurisdiction of Area 332, under the command of the Director of the Liceo Militar General Espejo based in that city.

Around 5:30 p.m., while walking along Calle Belgrano, they were surprised and subdued by a group of men. Some of them, belonging to the Argentine Army, were in uniform and were traveling in a truck belonging to that force.

Others, dressed in civilian clothes, were traveling in private cars identified with Argentine and Chilean license plates; among them were personnel from the local police and the Chilean DINA.

Hernández, Tamayo, and Muñoz were violently placed against a wall, searched, beaten, and then forced into the military truck. Muñoz stood up inside the vehicle, the bed of which had no canvas cover, and raised his arms to draw the attention of passersby. However, they threw him to the floor of the truck. They set off and took them to one of the military units located in Parque San Martín.

That same night, in the back of a pickup truck, they were transported to Chile. There, they were taken first to the clandestine detention center (CCD) known as “Cuatro Álamos,” located in the city of Santiago, and then housed in the CCD “Villa Grimaldi,” on the outskirts of the city, where they were savagely tortured.

It was at the Villa Grimaldi CCD where they were last seen. Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe, Manuel Jesús Tamayo Martínez, and Luis Gonzalo Muñoz Velásquez remain forcibly disappeared to this day.

The Muñoz Velásquez family learned of what happened immediately, as one of his brothers witnessed the operation and notified their relatives in Chile so that they could take action.

For its part, the Hernández Zaspe family found out a few days later, when Flor, Luis's sister, traveled to Mendoza and met Jorge Quesada, her brother's friend, at her brother's home. He told her what had happened and recommended that she return to Chile, as he feared the house was being watched.

Furthermore, worried about not having news of him, they wrote to a relative, who, after some inquiries, confirmed that Juan Humberto had been detained in Mendoza and handed over to the Chilean forces by the Argentine authorities.

The Tamayo Martínez family also learned of the detention a few days after it occurred, as, in addition to the news that Flor Hernández Zaspe brought from Mendoza, they received a call that alerted them.

Since then, the three families attempted to file complaints and take steps to find their loved ones, but none of these efforts yielded results. Both the Argentine and Chilean authorities denied information regarding their whereabouts.

Evidence

The facts related are supported by abundant testimonial and documentary evidence incorporated into the debate.

Flor Hernández Zaspe, Juan Humberto's sister, testified in this debate regarding her brother's political affiliation and the persecution he suffered for that reason. She recounted the circumstances of her brother's exile in Mendoza and added that they always maintained fluid contact through correspondence.

She gave an account of the visit she made to the family home in Chile between December 1977 and the first days of January 1978, and the raids they suffered once her brother returned to Mendoza. In this sense, she related that the first few times they did not identify themselves, but by the third occasion, they presented themselves as members of the DINA and, after demanding Juan Humberto's presence, stated they knew he was in the city of Mendoza working against the Chilean dictatorship.

It is clear that this information came from the coordinated intelligence tasks that the Argentine and Chilean repressive forces were carrying out.

Flor Hernández Zaspe concluded that if the Chilean repressors already had that information, the reason for appearing at her home was to collect more data on her brother, such as activities or relationships he had in Mendoza.

She also concluded that the Chilean intelligence directorate operated in a coordinated manner with other military agencies in Latin America in search of their opponents, a point that has been proven in this trial.

Flor Hernández Zaspe claimed to have warned her brother about these raids and the information the repressors had, all of which motivated the cancellation of his next visit to Chile. In this regard, she added that once her brother Juan Humberto disappeared in Argentina, the DINA did not return to look for him at his home in Chile.

Regarding the kidnapping operation, Flor Hernández related the circumstances in which it occurred, all of which she was able to reconstruct based on the account of Chilean witnesses who witnessed it and who were also based in Mendoza.

In this sense, she explained that in the second week of April 1976, she traveled to Mendoza and met a young Chilean at her brother's house. He told her how Luis had been detained on a public street along with Muñoz Velázquez and Tamayo. Furthermore, she added that the young man recommended that they not file any complaint and return soon to Chile, as the situation in Mendoza was very difficult.

Flor Hernández Zaspe also remembered Manuel Jesús Tamayo Martínez, whom she knew from being friends in the neighborhood in Chile.

Honorable judges: in this courtroom, we have also heard from Manuel Tamayo's siblings, Juan Jorge and Adriana Iris Tamayo Martínez. Both referred to their brother's political trajectory and related the persecution to which he was subjected in his country.

Particularly, Juan Tamayo described the relationship that united him with Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe, with whom he shared political participation in the Socialist Party and with whom he had also lived in the city of Mendoza for a time.

Having also lived in that city, Juan Tamayo recalled the presence of Chilean DINA personnel on the streets of Mendoza and the insecurity this brought for Chilean refugees.

Both Juan and Adriana Tamayo recalled the way they learned about the disappearance of their brother Manuel in Mendoza and the difficulties they had in taking action.

For his part, Alex Muñoz Velázquez, Luis Gonzalo's brother, referred to his brother's political trajectory and the persecution to which he was subjected in Chile. He related his transfer to our country and the place where they settled in the city of Mendoza.

In the debate, José Cerda Herrera also provided testimony; he knew Luis Gonzalo Muñoz Velázquez from Chile and reunited with him in the Argentine city of Mendoza, where both had escaped due to the persecution in their country.

He recalled that it was there that he met Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe and Manuel Jesús Tamayo Martínez and that together, the four of them worked to regroup the exiled Chilean members of the party. Although he referred to the meetings, he clarified that for security reasons, they did not know the activities of the others.

Regarding the persecution in the city of Mendoza, Cerda Herrera recalled the presence of Chilean intelligence personnel who infiltrated the exiles, and that some even requested refugee status from the UNHCR, but that this organization rejected them.

Honorable judges: Alex Muñoz, María Cecilia Muñoz, and José Cerda Herrera witnessed the kidnappings of Hernández Zaspe, Tamayo Martínez, and Muñoz Velásquez. In this hearing, the three agreed on the circumstances in which the operation occurred, which we have already described.

The first two clarified that they were able to recognize that it was Luis Muñoz Velázquez and his friends when he waved his arms inside the military truck, showing himself, and they could clearly see that he was wearing the clothes they themselves had lent him that day.

In particular, Alex Muñoz described the presence of Chilean personnel and vehicles; and María Muñoz clarified that she was able to recognize the Chilean personnel by their tone of voice.

The three also explained what the fate of the victims was, according to what they were able to reconstruct over time. Thus, the three affirmed that after their detentions, Hernández Zaspe, Muñoz Velázquez, and Tamayo Martínez were transported from the city of Mendoza to Chile, where they were last seen at the CCD known as Villa Grimaldi.

In particular, Flor Hernández Zaspe referred to the correspondence they exchanged with a relative who, at that time, was the Archbishop of Santa Fe, Vicente Hernández Zaspe, whom they asked for help in locating Juan Humberto.

He informed them that after his detention in Mendoza, his brother and his companions were handed over by the Argentine authorities to the Chilean forces and that he was in a “camp in Peñalolén.” The witness added that years later she learned that it was the CCD “Villa Grimaldi”; and that there were survivors of that detention center who remembered the arrival, from Argentina, of 3 prisoners who were in very poor health.

In this sense, we have heard in this courtroom from witnesses Gabriela Salazar and Juan Carlos Feres Nazarala, survivors of Chilean detention centers, who shared captivity with Hernández Zaspe, Tamayo Martínez, and Muñoz Velázquez and who finish proving the clandestine transfers from the Argentine city of Mendoza to Chile.

Gabriela Salazar, a survivor of the Villa Grimaldi and Cuatro Álamos detention centers, recalled the arrival of three detainees at the latter place of confinement, which she described as a transit point for detainees.

She told this courtroom that from the cell in which she was held, she could hear that the new arrivals were asking the guards of the place to give them water and were complaining of exhaustion from having been transported from the city of Mendoza.

Salazar clarified that although she could not speak directly with them, she heard those moans and, years later, related what she experienced with what was known up to that moment about the fate of Hernández, Tamayo, and Muñoz.

She explained that due to the location of her cell, she could hear if the detainees who arrived were housed in Cuatro Álamos or if they were transferred immediately. That is why she asserted that the detained Muñoz, Hernández, and Tamayo did not enter the detention center, as they were transferred.

On the other hand, her testimony also illustrates the dimension of Condor and the interaction of Chile with the rest of the dictatorships of the Southern Cone, as she recalled other kidnapped persons who were transferred to Chile from other countries.

Added to Salazar's testimony is that of Juan Carlos Feres Nazarala, a survivor of the CCD located on the outskirts of the city of Santiago de Chile known as “Villa Grimaldi,” who shared captivity with Luis Gonzalo Muñoz Velásquez.

Feres recalled that although he could not see him, they were able to talk. Thus, he was able to verify the deplorable physical state in which Muñoz was by the way he complained of pain. Feres concluded that, without a doubt, Muñoz had been tortured in that CCD.

Feres also reproduced in the hearing everything that Muñoz told him about the circumstances of his kidnapping in the city of Mendoza, the participation of Argentine and Chilean personnel in that procedure, and the transfer to Chile, by land, in the back of a pickup truck.

He also added that Muñoz detailed the complicity of the authorities of both countries when, at the time of the transfer, he heard them making joking comments about the cargo they were transporting.

In addition to what Muñoz himself related about the presence of DINA personnel in the operation, Feres recalled that in the detention center there was an officer of that corps who, interpreting the macabre role of the “good cop” and after not having visited him for six or seven days, appeared and offered him an Argentine-brand cigarette.

This officer told him that he had bought them recently in Argentina, where he had had to travel to carry out a mission.

Feres Nazarala explained that although in Villa Grimaldi he could not talk to or see Hernández Zaspe and Tamayo Martínez, he knew from Muñoz that they were also transferred to that CCD. He also explained that, judging by the deplorable physical state in which Muñoz was after having been tortured, it was possible that Hernández and Tamayo had died as a result of the torments received in that place.

Finally, Feres Nazarala recalled Muñoz's concern that his family did not know he was detained on Chilean soil and, for that reason, as soon as he regained his freedom, he made this circumstance known to a lawyer who notified his family.

The synthesized evidentiary framework is reinforced by the abundant documentary evidence incorporated into this debate. Among it, we have the handwritten letters by Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe, provided by his sister Flor when she testified at the hearing.

In them, the fluid communication he maintained with his family is evident. In addition to telling about his work activities, Hernández relates the harassment that Chileans suffered at the hands of the Argentine authorities. The last letter received is dated March 21, 1976, a few days before his kidnapping and disappearance.

Also incorporated are the records sent by the justice system of Mendoza, where the background information that both the Vicariate of Solidarity of Chile and the Mendoza regional office of the Ecumenical Movement for Human Rights had regarding these events was compiled.

Likewise, their disappearances are also the subject of investigation before the Chilean justice system within the framework of case no. 2182-98 “Operation Condor,” some elements of which were sent via letters rogatory and incorporated into this debate.

Among them, we have the filings and complaints made by the victims' relatives, who related the circumstances regarding the disappearance of their loved ones, in the same way they did in this hearing.

As we have already explained, here too, the deaths or removals of some defendants and the limitations of the investigative stage prevent us from making formal accusations against some of those responsible for these events.

For the moment, it is only appropriate to mention that for the illegal deprivation of liberty of Juan Humberto Hernández Zaspe, Carlos Horacio Tragant is charged, to which we will return when examining his responsibility.

Source: mpf.gob.ar undated