Juan Hernández Rivera is the current director of the Carabineros de Chile Social Security Directorate (Dipreca), an institution that manages the social security and health system for uniformed personnel of the Carabineros, Gendarmería, and the Investigative Police (PDI).

Although his role has gone largely unnoticed by the press and public opinion, this has not been the case for the more than 400 employees nationwide, and even less so for the representatives of the entity's civil servant associations, who, in conversation with Interferencia, accuse Hernández of intimidation and even threats.

Hernández is an auditor accountant from the Universidad de Chile, a forensic accounting expert, and holds a master's degree in didactics for higher education, although his career was primarily built within the Investigative Police (PDI), where he reached the high institutional command, serving as Chief of Finance, Chief of Anti-Narcotics, and Deputy Director of Operations.

In June 2018, he was appointed General Administrator of Dipreca, an entity under the Ministry of the Interior. Subsequently, he was appointed acting director until December of the same year—via a decree signed by then-President Sebastián Piñera and Minister of the Interior Andrés Chadwick—when he was appointed National Director of Dipreca.

As the months progressed, tension between the employees and the director escalated, as it did with union leaders. However, the situation became untenable for the presidents of the associations on September 23, 2021.

According to Janette Droguett, president of one of these associations, Anfup, when the meeting had concluded, she went down in the elevator with the national director and two other officials. There, as she recounts, Hernández asked her if she still lived in Renca, the commune where he had also lived.

She replied that she did, to which he said, "And what would happen if I sent some friends to your house?"

According to Droguett, this threat referred to his "friends" in the PDI and other uniformed personnel, some also linked to the dictatorship's intelligence services.

"It was a direct threat to my person, a repeated situation, and with witnesses; the institutional prosecutor was there. It might seem self-referential, but I see it beyond being the president of an organization; as a woman and representative of an organization, behind me are employees whom I represent," states Droguett.

The threat generated fear not only for the leader but also for her family, affecting Droguett's mood and stress levels for some time.

This was not the first time Hernández had engaged in verbal abuse against Droguett. Months earlier, after she recovered from Covid and returned to her duties, he had commented that he would have liked "for you to be intubated," referring to severe cases of Covid-19.

The leader of another civil servant association, Anfudi, Patricia Catalán, states that in addition to these attitudes, the national director has insisted on the dismissal of members of both associations, cases that in many instances ended up in court.

In addition to these accusations, there have been several disagreements between Hernández and Dipreca employees, who are mostly civilians. One was the arbitrary transfer of workers from the Service's Welfare department, a department that also included union leaders from Anfup among its staff.

The measure, in July 2021, which the leaders and workers argued did not adhere to regulations, ended with a ruling from the Court of Appeals ordering a stay of execution, and therefore, that the workers remain in their jobs.

Also, at the beginning of this year, Hernández attempted to close the employees' cafeteria at the Dipreca office facilities on Calle 21 de Mayo in Santiago, which is used by an average of 200 employees per month.

However, the measure was not implemented. Added to this is his fixation on security and surveillance in the same building, which has resulted not only in the hiring of more security guards but also in the installation of cameras in almost every space of the premises.

Hernández's attitude was also reportedly repeated in the case of a professional employee of the institution, who constantly received comments from Hernández about his long hair and sexual orientation, a case that even reached the Comptroller's Office.

"The director would see the employee in the hallway and tell him that he looked like a woman, that from behind he looked like a woman, and that it caused confusion," says Droguett.

"It is a way of operating in the institution: intimidation. Intimidating the leader also generates fear in the employees, since the leader has union immunity and a certain protection, but the employees do not, and therefore they fear being fired," the leader adds.

Interferencia attempted to contact the Dipreca director to obtain his version of these situations, via telephone and email, without receiving a response by the time of this edition's closing.

Seeking Hernández's removal before Boric

Faced with this series of situations, the leaders have begun to appeal to the new authorities to request Hernández's removal from office.

"We delivered two letters before the new government took office, at 'la Moneda chica.' And after they took office, we delivered a letter to President Boric, to the Minister of the Interior, Izkia Siches, and to the Undersecretariat. We also had a hearing with authorities from the Ministry of Women, since female leaders have been intimidated here," says Patricia Catalán.

This week marks one month since both letters were issued to the president and the minister, on March 15, so they hope to finalize a meeting as soon as possible.

Controversial advisors

Among the hires Hernández has made in his position as director of Dipreca for his cabinet are four former PDI officials, the institution where he worked for years. All four, with salaries over $1.8 million pesos, also receive their PDI pensions, which fluctuate between $1 million and $3 million pesos.

Among these advisors hired by Hernández is Sergio Mellado Faúndez, a PDI retiree with a pension of $3.4 million and a salary at Dipreca of $2.46 million. Mellado's name also appears in journalist Javier Rebolledo's 2012 book, La Danza de los Cuervos, as a former DINA agent.

In the book, Rebolledo recounts that in the late seventies, the DINA created the Loyola Barracks in the commune of Quinta Normal, located on Camino de Loyola, between Calle Marte and Calle Neptuno. The facility was in charge of Army Captain Ernesto Ureta Pernas.

"Last in the chain of command was the sub-commissioner of the Investigative Police, Sergio Mellado Faúndez. Mellado reached the rank of prefect and was head of Informatics and Telecommunications for the Investigative Police until 2009, the year he retired.

I only remembered this name for this book. It is not found in his statements for the case," narrates Rebolledo in his book, alluding to the narrative of Jorgelino Vergara, known as "el mocito," a former DINA agent.

Subsequently, he adds that Mellado, along with Vergara and other DINA agents, participated in an operation to vote illegally in several schools for the 1980 plebiscite. As narrated in the book, the agents moved in groups from one school to another in Santiago to vote multiple times to approve the Constitution proposed by the dictatorship.

In a 2008 report by the newspaper La Nación, Mellado Faúndez is also mentioned as a close associate of the then-director of the PDI, Arturo Herrera. It is also mentioned that Mellado was a field agent for the CNI in the eighties.

"According to court records, Mellado Faúndez has testified in several judicial proceedings (among others, Operation Albania), because he was an operational agent of the CNI, that is, he performed field functions.

He has testified before Santiago Court of Appeals ministers Joaquín Billard and Jorge Zepeda. For many, it was a surprise that the former agent had ascended from head of a small communal brigade (Bicrim Peñaflor) to a national leadership position," the article notes.

One year after that note, Mellado retired.

Another of the advisors hired by the Dipreca director is Fernando Antonio Vega Evaristi, also a PDI pensioner with $1.8 million, who currently earns over $3 million pesos. Vega was head of Finance for the PDI for years, a position in which the Comptroller's Office, in 2018, held him responsible, along with other officials, for approving $1 billion pesos in expenses for study tours, as reported at the time by El Desconcierto.

Darío Andrés Ortega Moreno is also another of the Dipreca director's advisors. Retired from the PDI with more than $3 million pesos per month, he holds a salary of almost $2 million pesos. He was Deputy Director of Operations of the PDI and in August of last year was called to testify by the Prosecutor's Office in the case of the use of confidential funds in the institution, where Héctor Espinosa is being investigated.

Espinosa is being investigated for the embezzlement of public funds of more than $140 million pesos.

Source: interferencia.cl, April 13, 2022

The former CNI agent who works in Civil Defense paid by the Ministry of Defense

Between 1982 and 1986, he was at the Loyola barracks. There, he exercised middle-management tasks over the most bloodthirsty members of the Lautaro Brigade who came from the Simón Bolívar extermination barracks.

Regarding this, he states categorically that "I only performed administrative tasks there. Besides, I am very Catholic and my hands are clean." He says he never performed operational functions, detaining people or spying. But Jorgelino Vergara, El Mocito, maintains the opposite.

It is an old mansion on Calle Vergara where Felipe Enrique Ricardo Palacios Cabrera works. High ceilings, with a large patio. A family atmosphere. That is where the Civil Defense department of the Ministry of Defense is located.

Palacios is the head of Planning for the entity. The Army Lieutenant Colonel (R) receives us kindly. Somewhat restless. He takes barely a second to respond without hesitation, as if he were expecting the question: Yes, I was a CNI agent.

But the head of Planning was not a simple agent. Between 1982 and 1986, he was at the Loyola barracks. There, he exercised middle-management tasks over the most bloodthirsty members of the Lautaro Brigade who came from the Simón Bolívar extermination barracks.

Although he states categorically that "I only performed administrative tasks there. Besides, I am very Catholic and my hands are clean." He says he never performed operational functions, detaining people or spying. But Jorgelino Vergara, El Mocito, maintains the opposite.

It was he who, without hesitation, recognized him in Palacios's official photograph on the Civil Defense page of the Ministry of Defense. "In Palacios's operational group were also Lieutenant Fernando Paredes Uribe, son of General Fernando Paredes who was director of the Investigative Police, Lieutenant Brito, and Lieutenant Ramón Briceño Rodríguez, of the Carabineros," Vergara told us. "With his group, Palacios was operational at times, detaining people."

In journalist Javier Rebolledo's book, La Danza de los Cuervos, El Mocito identified Palacios Cabrera as one of those who held command at the Loyola barracks, under the tutelage of Army Captain Ernesto Ureta Pernas.

Palacios's stay at the Loyola barracks gradually emerged during our conversation. At first, he said he was never in Santiago during that period. Then, that he was only at Loyola for one year. Upon insisting, his stay at that barracks increased to two years. Finally, he admitted that he was there for four years.

He reiterates categorically: "I have nothing to do with it, my hands are clean. I have never been prosecuted for anything, and a judge has never called me to testify for any human rights case." In 2001, a witness, whose name was never publicly known, identified him as one of the custodians in Montevideo of the DINA chemist, Eugenio Berríos, murdered in 1992 by members of the Chilean and Uruguayan army intelligence.

But, finally, his name was definitively ruled out in the process.

With the peacocks

In 1987, after the attack in the Cajón del Maipo, Palacios went as head of security for Augusto Pinochet and his family at the Bucalemu mansion, in the commune of Santo Domingo in the Fifth Region. "Nothing ever happened there," he explains, "and the Pinochets entertained themselves playing with the peacocks they had," which he also enjoyed.

El Mocito says that Palacios Cabrera was even one of the members of the Martyrs' Avengers Command (Covema), which Palacios also absolutely denies. Jorgelino Vergara identified him as part of this command in the book La Danza de los Cuervos, where he also names CNI agents Jorge Díaz Radulovich, Guillermo Ferrán Martínez, and Carabineros Lieutenant Ramón Briceño Rodríguez as participants.

Once democracy was recovered, Palacios leaned toward intelligence, taking courses at the Army Intelligence School in Nos. In that way, in 1992, he entered the Army Intelligence Directorate (DINE), where he remained until 2003, when he retired with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. "At the DINE, I was in counterintelligence," he states.

But his stay at the Loyola barracks keeps coming up in the conversation. He acknowledges that his alias there was Tomás Jarpa Urzúa, as recorded in a 2007 police report. We asked him about detainees at that barracks. "At least I never saw detainees there," he responds.

But without being a place specially designated for the torture and imprisonment of opponents of the dictatorship, there were indeed detainees at Loyola, at least as a transit point to the Borgoño barracks, the CNI's operational headquarters in Santiago under the command of Álvaro Corbalán.

The Covema

El Mocito says that Palacios Cabrera was even one of the members of the Martyrs' Avengers Command (Covema), which Palacios also absolutely denies. Jorgelino Vergara identified him as part of this command in the book La Danza de los Cuervos, where he also names CNI agents Jorge Díaz Radulovich, Guillermo Ferrán Martínez, and Carabineros Lieutenant Ramón Briceño Rodríguez as participants.

At the beginning of 1980, the MIR regrouped part of its forces, some having returned clandestinely to Chile from Cuba and the German Democratic Republic. Assaults on banks and police stations began. The regime's security went on alert. On July 15, 1980, a MIR command killed the Army's head of intelligence, Colonel Roger Vergara.

The Covema was a clandestine group of agents that formed after the murder of Colonel Vergara, precisely to "avenge its martyrs." To this day, it is not clear who comprised it. Whether they were only CNI agents, or if Carabineros and members of the civil police also participated.

Faced with the wave of attacks, on July 24, 1980, Pinochet removed General Odlanier Mena from the head of the CNI and appointed General Humberto Gordon. The latter formed the Anti-Subversive Command (CAS) with officials from the Investigative Police Homicide Brigade, the Carabineros OS-7, and agents from the CNI's Metropolitan Brigade.

It is still not clear if the 12 students, most from the MIR, who were detained in the days following the death of Roger Vergara, were detained by agents of the CAS, or the Covema, or both groups. Upon regaining their freedom, some of these detainees declared that their captors identified themselves as members of the Covema, discrediting the terrible job that "the cops and the detectives" had been doing.

But they did not say they belonged to the CNI.

Among these detainees, journalism student at the Universidad Católica, Eduardo Jara, died as a result of torture.

The mysterious Covema, to this day, was a feared name that circulated among opponents of the dictatorship in the early 80s. It is unknown if other victims were at the hands of this underground organization.

But El Mocito maintains that he "heard" at the Loyola barracks how some agents, among them those he names, spoke of the Covema and met at some cafes and restaurants in the upper part of Santiago. In 1988, in an interview, General Odlanier Mena said that the Covema was composed only of CNI agents.

Felipe Palacios sees us off from the door of his office with the same security with which he received us, but with a slight tremor in his hands.

Source: elmostrador.cl, August 16, 2012