Along with the official from the Corporation for the Promotion and Defense of the Rights of the People (Codepu), three militants of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front (FPMR) were murdered on the orders of Álvaro Corbalán, whose direct participation in two of the crimes was proven.

After 28 years since the murders occurred, the special judge Joaquín Billard announced the first-instance sentences against the Green Brigade of the National Intelligence Center (CNI)—a repressive organ of the dictatorship—for the cowardly murder of teacher Patricio Sobarzo (a militant of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left – MIR), Juan Varas Silva, Ana Delgado Tapia, and Enzo Muñoz Arévalo (of the FPMR), on July 2, 1984.

Teacher Patricio Sobarzo was a member of the Regional Board of the Corporation for the Promotion and Defense of the Rights of the People (Codepu), and in his capacity as a human rights defender, he unsuccessfully attempted to safeguard the physical integrity of a militant of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front, who was seriously wounded and being followed by CNI officials, losing his own life in this attempt.

Sobarzo was riddled with bullets near the Zanjón de la Aguada after being detained in a telephone booth near the Departamental roundabout.

THE FACTS

A militant of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front was in a clandestine clinic located in the commune of Macul, under the care of a paramedic. When his condition worsened, they chose to ask for help from Codepu, who designated Patricio Sobarzo to take charge of the case.

Upon verifying the health status of the wounded militant, Sobarzo and Arévalo left the place to make a phone call to try to locate a doctor or, failing that, to transport him to an embassy. They stopped near the Departamental roundabout, and Patricio Sobarzo got out of the car to call from a telephone booth on the other side of the street.

It was at that moment that a car with CNI agents suddenly appeared and proceeded to spray the driver of the car, Enzo Muñoz Arévalo, with gunfire. Also at that same moment, Patricio Sobarzo was severely beaten, forced into a vehicle, and taken to a vacant lot where he was subsequently murdered.

The left-wing militants who were in the clandestine clinic heard the shots and began to leave the place in small groups due to the danger of a raid on the residence. Among the people who left the house were Juan Varas Silva and Ana Delgado Tapia, who were detained in the vicinity of the house and taken to the CNI’s Cuartel Borgoño.

There, they were harshly interrogated and tortured, and then, in the early hours of the morning, they were taken from that place and transported to the vicinity of Callejón Lo Ovalle and San Petersburgo street, in the commune of San Joaquín. There, around 6 a.m., both detainees were cowardly executed by the CNI.

The official versions of that time, repeated by La Tercera and El Mercurio, spoke of shootouts, which the justice system has already proven was not the case.

Furthermore, the civil lawsuit for compensation for damages in favor of the plaintiffs was accepted.

THE SENTENCES

Álvaro Federico Julio Corbalán Castilla sentenced to 15 years in prison. Hernán Antonio Vásquez Villegas sentenced to 6 years in prison. Reimer Eduardo Kohlitz Fell sentenced to 6 years in prison. Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone sentenced to 3 years and one day. Jorge Eduardo Hernández sentenced to 3 years and one day. Published by Codepu

Source: elciudadano.cl, April 7, 2012

Supreme Court modifies ruling and convicts six CNI agents for the 1984 homicides of four people

The Supreme Court issued a final sentence for the qualified homicides of Enzo Muñoz Arévalo, Héctor Patricio Sobarzo Núñez, Juan Manuel Varas Silva, and Ana Alicia Delgado Tapia, crimes perpetrated on July 2 and 3, 1984, in various parts of the Metropolitan Region.

Enzo Muñoz, 30 years old, was a merchant, originally from the province of Arauco and a militant of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front (FPMR); Héctor Sobarzo, 31 years old, was a teacher, a native of Lebu and a militant of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR).

Both had been friends since their years living in the south. For his part, Juan Varas was a militant of the MIR and Ana Delgado was a member of the FPMR.

In a split decision (case file 27178-204), the Second Chamber of February—composed of ministers Hugo Dolmestch, Carlos Künsemüller, Haroldo Brito, Ricardo Blanco, and Andrea Muñoz—sentenced the former army officers and agents of the National Intelligence Center (CNI): Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, former lieutenant colonel, currently serving a sentence at the Punta Peuco Prison; Pedro Javier Guzmán Olivares, former colonel; Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, former lieutenant colonel; Reimer Eduardo Kohlitz Fell, former army major; and former army non-commissioned officers Hernán Antonio Vásquez Villegas, alias "Pablito," and Jorge Eduardo Hernández Espinoza, alias "Oscarito," to sentences of 15 years and one day in prison for their responsibility in the homicides of the 4 victims.

At the time the homicides occurred, Corbalán was serving as head of the CNI's Anti-Subversive Division, which operated at the Cuartel Borgoño in the capital; the other convicts were all members of the Green Brigade, a unit in charge of the persecution of the PC and the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front.

The first-instance ruling, issued in January 2012 by the visiting judge Joaquín Billard, had sentenced Corbalán to 15 years in prison, Kohlitz Fell and Vásquez Villegas to 6 years, Rubilar Ottone and Hernández Espinoza to a sentence of 3 years, and acquitted Guzmán Olivares.

The repeated practice of fake shootouts

According to the background information collected during the investigation stage, the visiting judge Joaquín Billard managed to prove that the four victims were murdered by the agents, debunking the official version that identified them as having died in shootouts with security forces.

"With the merit of the analyzed background, weighed in a legal manner, it has been established that, contrary to the official version, on July 2, 1984, at approximately 11:00 p.m., personnel from the so-called National Intelligence Center (CNI) who were traveling in a car from south to north, intercepted a private vehicle that was stopped on Avenida José Pedro Alessandri, three hundred meters before reaching the Departamental Roundabout, and at the moment when one of the occupants of the private vehicle went to a public telephone booth located in front of No. 6132 of that avenue, the CNI personnel riddled the driver of the vehicle who was inside it with bullets at that site, and after putting the other subject into a utility-type van, proceeded to execute him in the vicinity of the 'Zanjón de la Aguada,' a few meters from the detention site, an illicit act constituting the crime of qualified homicide against the persons of Enzo Muñoz Arévalo and Héctor Patricio Sobarzo Núñez," the ruling maintains.

The resolution adds: "With the merit of what was outlined above, it is justified in the case files that, on the night of July 2, 1984, agents of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), who made up the anti-subversive apparatus and whose headquarters were located at the Cuartel Borgoño in this city, proceeded to detain a man and a woman in the vicinity of the Departamental Roundabout, the place where a supposed shootout had taken place between personnel of the former CNI and supposed extremists, to subsequently transport both of them to the Cuartel Borgoño located in this city, where they were interrogated in the basement. Subsequently, in the early hours of the morning, both detainees were removed from that place and transported to the vicinity of Callejón Lo Ovalle and San Petersburgo street in the commune of San Joaquín, a place where, around 6 a.m., under the pretext of an armed confrontation, both detainees were executed by members of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), with the official version being given that the victims in the case had been killed in an armed confrontation in the vicinity of Callejón Lo Ovalle, facts constituting the crime of qualified homicide perpetrated against the persons of Juan Manuel Varas Silva and Ana Alicia Delgado Tapia."

The Supreme Court's final decision was adopted with the dissenting votes of ministers Dolmestch and Künsemüller, who were in favor of applying the statute of limitations. This attitude is almost customary for these two judges, who are ideologically in favor of granting undue benefits to criminals, even contravening international commitments that oblige the Chilean State to adopt specific anti-impunity and anti-privilege measures regarding crimes against humanity and human rights.

Source: resumen.cl, August 10, 2015

Former army colonel Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, a CNI agent who had been a fugitive since 2015, captured in Pucón

This Sunday afternoon, in a supermarket in the city of Pucón, the Location of Persons Brigade (BRIUP) of the Investigative Police (PDI) managed to capture the former army officer who operated at the CNI's Cuartel Borgoño during the 1980s, as part of the Anti-Subversive Division of the repressive entity in Santiago.

The captured Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, alias "El Gato," used the alias "Pedro Lira," called himself "Captain Lira," and acted in the Plomo, Apache, and Café units, and in the Green Brigade of the aforementioned Division.

In the latter, he operated as the head of the unit destined to combat the FPMR and the PC.

In August 2015, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison by the Supreme Court for the murders of Enzo Muñoz Arévalo, Patricio Sobarzo Núñez, Juan Varas Silva, and Ana Alicia Delgado Tapia, perpetrated on July 2 and 3, 1984, in Santiago.

Enzo Muñoz, 30 years old, was a merchant, originally from the province of Arauco and a militant of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front (FPMR); Héctor Sobarzo, 31 years old, was a teacher, a native of Lebu and a militant of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR).

Both had been friends since their years living in the south. For his part, Juan Varas was a militant of the MIR and Ana Delgado was a member of the FPMR.

In the court's ruling, in addition to former colonel Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, the former agents of the National Intelligence Center (CNI) were also convicted: Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, former lieutenant colonel, currently serving a sentence at the Punta Peuco Prison; former colonel Pedro Javier Guzmán Olivares; former army major Reimer Eduardo Kohlitz Fell; and former army non-commissioned officers Hernán Antonio Vásquez Villegas, alias "Pablito," and Jorge Eduardo Hernández Espinoza, alias "Oscarito," all to sentences of 15 years and one day in prison for their responsibility in the homicides of the 4 victims.

However, Rubilar Ottone refused to comply with the judicial ruling and escaped to hide in a clandestine life financed by his millionaire salary as a former army officer.

The escape lasted three years, until he was captured yesterday in the southern resort town.

The detainee was reportedly transported to Santiago by the PDI to be placed at the disposal of the courts.

Source: resumen.cl, July 9, 2018

Minister Marianela Cifuentes convicts CNI agents for qualified homicide and the application of torture

In the ruling (case file 38-2010), the visiting judge sentenced Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, Pedro Javier Guzmán Olivares, Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, and Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera to effective prison terms of 10 years and one day and 5 years, as authors of the crimes of qualified homicide and the application of torture causing serious injury, respectively.

The extraordinary visiting minister for human rights violation cases of the San Miguel Court of Appeals, Marianela Cifuentes Alarcón, convicted six agents of the dissolved National Intelligence Center (CNI) for their responsibility in the consummated crimes of the qualified homicide of Gilberto de las Mercedes Victoriano Veloso and the application of torture causing serious injury to Pablo Jury Guerrero González.

These crimes were committed in July 1985, in the communes of La Cisterna and Santiago, respectively.

In the ruling (case file 38-2010), the visiting judge sentenced Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone, Pedro Javier Guzmán Olivares, Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, and Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera to effective prison terms of 10 years and one day and 5 years, as authors of the crimes of qualified homicide and the application of torture causing serious injury, respectively.

Meanwhile, Germán Lisandro Sanhueza Figueroa and Carlos Enrique Altamirano will have to serve 10 years and 5 years in prison, as authors of the crimes of qualified homicide and the application of torture causing serious injury, respectively.

Green Brigade In the resolution, Minister Cifuentes Alarcón established the following facts:

1° That on July 1, 1985, around 10:00 a.m., Gilberto de las Mercedes Victoriano Veloso and Pablo Jury Guerrero González, members of the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front, arrived at Avenida Los Morros in the commune of La Cisterna in a Renault car owned by the latter and parked in front of the bakery located at No. 10,243 of the aforementioned avenue.

2° That, immediately thereafter, Pablo Guerrero González went to an apartment located on the second floor of the building at Avenida Los Morros No. 10,280, leaving Gilberto Victoriano Veloso inside the vehicle.

3° That, moments later, Guerrero González was intercepted by a team from the Green Brigade of the 'Bernardo O'Higgins' Anti-Subversive Unit of the National Intelligence Center, composed of agents Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera, Germán Lisandro Sanhueza Figueroa, and Carlos Enrique Altamirano Cea, who, having been previously alerted of his arrival at the location, were waiting for him in the vicinity of the indicated apartment, managing to detain him on Avenida Los Morros, meters from the car in which he was traveling.

4° That, later, agents Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera, and Germán Lisandro Sanhueza Figueroa headed toward the site where Gilberto Victoriano Veloso was located, who, upon noticing their presence, fled toward Alejandro Guzmán street, resulting in an exchange of gunfire.

5° That Victoriano Veloso entered an interior dead-end alleyway located at Alejandro Guzmán street No. 348 and, in front of house D, upon seeing himself cornered, threw the firearm he was carrying to the ground and raised his hands in a sign of surrender.

6° That, at that instant, agents Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera, and Germán Lisandro Sanhueza Figueroa fired at Gilberto Victoriano Veloso, who was defenseless, causing him multiple wounds that led to his death.

7° That, after the events that ended in the death of Gilberto de las Mercedes Victoriano Veloso occurred, agents Osvaldo Patricio Cornejo Marillanca, Pedro del Carmen Mora Herrera, and Carlos Enrique Altamirano Cea, with the operational names 'Ernesto Reyes Romo,' 'Raúl Navarro Rivera,' and 'Freddy González Riquelme,' respectively, transported the detainee Guerrero González to the Cuartel Borgoño, located in the commune of Santiago, the site where the Green Brigade of the 'Bernardo O'Higgins' Anti-Subversive Unit of the National Intelligence Center operated, a place where, after identifying him, they forced him to undress and put on denim overalls and sneakers and locked him in a room, keeping him in that facility for three days, a period during which he was repeatedly subjected to interrogations and illegitimate coercion, specifically, the application of electricity and high-energy blows to various parts of his body, immersion in a tub of water in which they submerged his head until he lacked air, and threats against his life, which caused him serious physical injuries, such as a cervical luxo-fracture of C2 and C3, fractures of the 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th right ribs, and chronic psychological sequelae.

8° That, on July 1, 1985, Marco Antonio Guerrero González, brother of Pablo Jury Guerrero González, filed a writ of amparo before the Presidente Aguirre Cerda Court of Appeals, questioning the legality of his brother's detention, and in the course of the processing of the aforementioned writ of amparo, said court ordered that the detainee Pablo Guerrero González be transported on the morning of July 4, 1985, to the premises of the Presidente Aguirre Cerda Court of Appeals in order to verify his condition, an occasion on which he was interrogated and underwent a medical examination by a doctor from the Legal Medical Service, with his immediate hospitalization at the Emergency Post of the Barros Luco Hospital being ordered as a result of what was recounted by the detainee and the injuries verified.

9° That, at that time, the National Intelligence Center (CNI) was in charge of two officers of the Chilean Army, Major General Humberto Gordon Rubio—in the capacity of director—and Brigadier General Hugo Salas Wenzel—in the capacity of deputy director—both deceased.

10° That, in the indicated period, the aforementioned 'Bernardo O'Higgins' Anti-Subversive Unit of the National Intelligence Center was in charge of Army Major Álvaro Julio Federico Corbalán Castilla, and the Green Brigade, dependent on the 'Bernardo O'Higgins' Anti-Subversive Unit, which dealt with the repression of the Communist Party and the Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front, was under the command of Army Captain Juan Eduardo Rubilar Ottone—in the capacity of head—and Army Captain Pedro Javier Guzmán Olivares—as deputy head."

In the civil sphere, the sentence ordered the treasury to pay total compensation of $340,000,000 for moral damages to the spouse and children of Victoriano Veloso. Meanwhile, the direct victim Guerrero González will receive compensation of $100,000,000 for moral damages.

Source: pdju.cl, October 3, 2024