On September 27, a military patrol arrived at the CHILEAN AUTOS company and detained two of its workers, both of whom were union leaders. They were:

Mario PARRA GUZMAN, 29 years old, laborer; and

Luis Ricardo HERRERA GONZALEZ, 34 years old, laborer, member of the Communist Party.

Their bodies appeared the following day in front of a "Peugeot" company garage, bearing gunshot wounds. The management of CHILEAN AUTOS requested information from the Army regarding the detention of two of its workers, to which the institution responded that "these individuals had indeed been detained and interrogated at a Military Unit, but that they had been released at 21:15 hours." It added that "there is no information regarding their activities between the time they were released and the discovery of their bodies the following day; however, it is possible to presume that both activists confronted an unidentified patrol with weapons, and in said confrontation, the aforementioned citizens lost their lives."

Given that the detention of the victims is corroborated by the express statement of their captors; the implausibility of the official response provided by the Army regarding the release of the detainees during curfew hours; the fact that it is even less credible that the detainees would have been carrying weapons immediately after their release, only to then confront an unknown military patrol; the political affiliation of the victims and their positions as union leaders; and the cause and circumstances of their deaths, the Commission has formed the conviction that the execution of Mario Parra Guzmán and Luis Ricardo Herrera González constituted a grave violation of their fundamental rights, attributable to State agents.