On August 22, 1974, MIR militant Modesto Segundo ESPINOZA POZO, an accountant by profession, was arrested in Santiago.

The detainee was forcibly disappeared while in the custody of the DINA, having been seen by witnesses at the José Domingo Cañas and Cuatro Álamos detention centers.

The Commission is convinced that his disappearance was the work of State agents, who thereby violated his human rights.

Modesto Segundo Espinoza Pozo, married, father of five, and a militant of the MIR, was detained around 05:00 in the morning on August 22, 1974, at his home located in Villa Lo Arrieta, in the current commune of Peñalolén.

A group of military personnel wearing olive-green uniforms and black berets arrived at his home. They knocked on the door asking for the victim, as they apparently carried a list with the names of people from the neighborhood. They then entered the house violently, striking and insulting Modesto Espinoza’s spouse. They forced him to get up, get dressed, and took him out of the house.

Along with other detained residents, he was taken to a field in the area. Meanwhile, his wife and five children remained in the house under the guard of military personnel. One of the children, who managed to go out into the street, saw his father being held in a truck, bound.

The wife went to the field, where the military personnel told her that the detainees were being taken to the Escuela Militar. Shortly thereafter, she managed to go to that location, where she was able to see her husband inside the military facility.

Upon returning home, the military personnel were searching the house, causing damage to the floor and belongings; she was beaten and threatened again. The uniformed men left around noon.

The following day, the detainee was brought to his home by his captors; he showed clear signs of having been mistreated. They removed two hollow iron pipes from the house that served as supports for a water tap and a plant, respectively.

The detention of the victim occurred during an operation carried out in the area on August 22 and 23, 1974, in which members of the Army, Air Force, Carabineros, Investigations, and security agents participated.

Among them was Osvaldo Romo Mena, a DINA agent, a former neighbor of that residential area known for his activities as a political leader identified with the Unidad Popular and as a neighborhood leader, who called himself "Commander Raúl." During the operation, he acted while wearing an Air Force uniform.

Of the large group of residents detained during those days, six of them, including Modesto Espinoza, remain forcibly disappeared to this day. They are: Stalin Arturo Aguilera Peñaloza, local leader of the Communist Party; Roberto Enrique Aranda Romero, militant of the Communist Party and secretary of the Villa Naciones Unidas Neighborhood Council No. 19; Manuel Filamir Cartes Lara, local leader of the Communist Party; José Segundo Flores Rojas, militant of the Communist Party; and Eduardo Fernando Zúñiga Zúñiga, local leader of the Communist Party.

Modesto Espinoza’s spouse, Carmen Quezada Fuentes, suffered continuous harassment and was monitored and detained on more than one occasion.

A former detainee, Manuel Salinas, who was held between July and November 1974 at "Cuatro Álamos," declared that he had been in the same room as the victim and Eduardo Zúñiga between August and September 1974.

In July 1975, his name appeared on a list of 119 Chileans who had allegedly died abroad in clashes with security forces or due to internal infighting. The news was published by the newspaper "El Mercurio" on July 25, reproducing information that had appeared in the newspaper "O' Día" in Brazil and the weekly "Lea" in Argentina.

This information could never be confirmed by the authorities of those countries nor by the Chilean government. All the names on the list corresponded to people who had been detained in Chile and remain forcibly disappeared to this day.

Judicial and/or Administrative Proceedings

On September 2, 1974, a writ of amparo (habeas corpus), case file No. 1.033-74, was filed before the Santiago Court of Appeals on behalf of Modesto Espinoza and Ema Cárdenas Moreno, a neighbor detained on the same occasion.

The Court received reports from the Commander-in-Chief of the Jurisdictional Area of the Second Army Division, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Ministry of Defense, which stated that they had no record of detention or proceedings against either of the two individuals.

Based on this information, the Court rejected the appeal and ordered the files to be sent to the corresponding Criminal Court to investigate the possible commission of a crime.

On December 6, 1974, case file 769-8 for alleged disappearance was opened at the 11th Criminal Court of Santiago. The complainant appeared before the Court and confirmed the circumstances under which her spouse was detained.

In compliance with the investigation order issued by the Court, the inspector of the Ñuñoa Investigations Police Station, Mario Urízar Mujica, reported having interviewed Ema Moreno Cárdenas, who stated that she was indeed detained on the same day as her neighbor Modesto Espinoza by military personnel.

Her home was also raided in search of weapons, for which they performed excavations with shovels and pickaxes, finding nothing. She was then taken to the Escuela Militar, where she was interrogated, and after a few days, transferred to a facility that turned out to be the Tres Álamos Detention Camp.

In both facilities, she stated she had seen Modesto Espinoza. She was released approximately 15 days after her detention.

On December 24, 1974, the Judge declared the summary closed and temporarily dismissed the case on the grounds that the crime was not sufficiently proven, a resolution that was approved by the Santiago Court of Appeals on April 1, 1975.

On January 24, 1976, the spouse of Modesto Espinoza and the mother of Sergio Reyes Navarrete filed a writ of amparo on behalf of their relatives before the Santiago Court of Appeals, which was assigned case No. 83-76.

In the filing, the petitioners stated they had reliable information that both detainees were held until January 18, 1976, at the DINA detention center known as Villa Grimaldi, located at Calle José Arrieta No. 8.200, and had subsequently been sent to the "Cuatro Álamos" Detention Camp, where they were being held incommunicado.

The petitioners requested the presence of a Court Minister at the aforementioned facility to verify the truth of their claims, considering the time elapsed since the detentions—more than a year in both cases—and the fact that both appeared on the list of 119 people allegedly killed in clashes abroad.

This request was rejected by the Santiago Court of Appeals, and based solely on the report from the Minister of the Interior indicating that they were not being held, the court rejected the appeal and ordered the files to be sent to the corresponding Criminal Court to investigate the possible commission of a crime regarding the disappearance of the individuals.

The resolution was appealed and confirmed by the Supreme Court on February 17, 1976.

As a result of the multiple problems experienced by the family, his spouse Carmen Quezada and their five children were forced to leave the country in 1982.

One of the captors, Osvaldo Romo Mena, who acted dressed as an Air Force officer during the detention of Espinoza Pozo, was arrested in November 1992. The aforementioned former DINA agent lived under a false identity for 17 years in Brazil, the country from which he was expelled.

By December 1992, he had been interrogated in several cases involving forcibly disappeared persons, and in 6 of them, an indictment had been issued against him. It was hoped that in this and other cases, he would provide information that would help clarify the fate of some of the forcibly disappeared.

Source: Corporation report