On sale starting today in Santiago bookstores, the book by journalist Javier Rebolledo narrates the life of Jorgelino Vergara, "El Mocito" of the DINA, and with it, the rawest episode in Chilean history: the crimes of the Lautaro Brigade at the Simón Bolívar barracks, the only extermination center known to date.

This time, the disclosures come from the mouths of the dictatorship's own former agents. Exclusively, textual episodes from the account. Jorgelino Vergara Bravo, known for his participation in the documentary El Mocito, remained silent for thirty years.

In 2007, he revealed to the justice system his participation in the Simón Bolívar barracks, where the Lautaro Brigade—the most trusted operational group of Manuel Contreras—operated. In this book, built on thirty hours of interviews, journalist Javier Rebolledo unveils, through Vergara's eyes, his youth in the DINA director's house as an assistant waiter, his rise within the structure to the Lautaro Brigade, and his fall, becoming an outcast.

Along with the confessions of his former comrades in the Calle Conferencia case (still under investigative summary), Jorgelino reveals the most violent episode recorded in Chile's history: the extermination of an indeterminate number of human beings, many of them members of the Communist Party, but also many citizens with no political involvement.

Furthermore, the account provides a detailed day-to-day account of the interior of the only extermination center known to date, in the purest Nazi style. Here, unlike other narratives, it is the vision of the perpetrators, the confession of their crimes, that constructs the history.

Although it is on sale today in Santiago bookstores, the official launch will be next Monday, June 25, at 19:30 hours in the Master Room of the Radio Universidad de Chile. Below are selected quotes from La Danza de los Cuervos:

THE BONES OF THE SHINS

“After Jorgelino, Eduardo Oyarce described the crime of Fernando Ortiz near the gym. They amused themselves by beating him throughout the night; Army non-commissioned officer Hiro Álvarez Vega and one other.

I only knew his alias: 'Pato Lucas.' 'He was brutally beaten with sticks on his shins, to the point where the bones could be seen, and they left him dying. That was taken advantage of by the torturers to stomp on his chest at the level of his heart, supposedly to revive him.'” Héctor Valdebenito, the “Viejo Valde,” admitted to having seen him die while interrogating him.

According to him, that was when he told him his name and that they had detained him on Calle Pedro de Valdivia. “I approached, stood in front of him, asked him a question, and realized that the man was speaking in a broken, low voice as a result of the blows he had received from the ‘Elefante’ [Juvenal Piña] and ‘Mario Primero’ [Eduardo Reyes Lagos].

From there he began to lose his voice, he leaned to the right side, and seeing that he was fainted, I called Morales, Barriga, and Lawrence, and they confirmed he was dead.” He was left lying on the side of the gym next to other detainees, tied up and sitting on the floor, still alive.

That same day, the cook Carlos Marcos Muñoz saw the group of detainees still alive in the gym, in poor physical condition. One, whom he later identified as Horacio Cepeda Marinkovic, a member of Fernando Ortiz's clandestine leadership, asked him for a glass of water.

He brought it to him, and instantly the man began to vomit blood. He fell to the floor, apparently dead. “That same day, while I was in the kitchen, I observed that the Carabineros official with the surname Pichunman burned his fingerprints and face with a blowtorch.” He also remembered that this detainee was put in a sack by “Chancho” Daza, who loaded him into the barracks' Chevrolet C-10 pickup truck.

Eduardo Oyarce declared having seen the moment of Horacio Cepeda Marinkovic's death. “He was detained for about five days before subsequently being eliminated with blows to the head from sticks given by the ‘Elefante’ [Juvenal Piña, murderer of Víctor Díaz], who also squeezed his trachea.

I saw it and could hear the screams the old man was making.” Several agents agree that during that day and the next, there was a more or less numerous group of detainees at the Simón Bolívar barracks. The versions range from six to fifteen.

They were likely the bodies of the eleven members of the Communist Party's clandestine leadership headed by Fernando Ortiz: Armando Portilla, Fernando Navarro, Lincoyán Berríos, Horacio Cepeda, Waldo Pizarro, Reinalda Pereira, Luis Lazo, Héctor Véliz, Lisandro Cruz, and Edras Pinto, along with MIR militants Edmundo Araya and Carlos Durán who, at that time, were coordinated with the Communist Party. (Chapter 27, Pidiendo huevadas).

NECK BROKEN

“We dragged the detainee to the car and set off with Daza, Escalona, and apparently Meza, toward Cuesta Barriga. Upon arriving at the cave, we went into the entrance, and I told the others to carry out the order.

At that moment, Daza grabbed the detainee from behind, passing his arm around his neck, and the detainee, despite how bad he was, reacted and began to kick, until I grabbed his feet while others secured him from above, and at that moment Daza gave the detainee's neck a very sharp turn to one side and broke his neck.

The detainee remained motionless, dead. The body was carried by two others; I shone a flashlight, they took him to the back, and he was thrown into the pit. I never told this before, not even to my family.” (Chapter 24, La limpieza mecánica. Police statement by agent Héctor Valdebenito regarding the crime of MIR militant Ángel Guerrero Carrillo).

THE GOOD SERVANT

“Within the environment, he also had to fit in, to be up to the task. If he passed by, he looked at the detainee with contempt; that was well-regarded. Or a kick, too. Thus, within that system, no one could fail.

Neither could he. All dogs. All crazy. Do not show even a feeling of compassion. Inside, obviously, he felt something, but he wanted to be within that group to advance and make his military career. If they saw him as weak, even if they didn't say anything, they would realize it. ‘The kid is no good, he’s not tough, he’s not a dog like us.’ No, he didn't want to be left out.

Did he have the freedom to leave and abandon all that? He thought about it many times, but no. Unacceptable. It meant returning to the street, leaving the world in which he was learning, where he received his daily food and teachings.

Or perhaps it could be worse; a simple ‘eliminate him’ was enough. So, when he showed himself like that, like them, mean, cold, when he gave kicks, when he looked at a detainee with hatred, with a word, a shout, he received a gesture of approval in return. ‘You’re doing well, you’re on the right track.’” (Chapter 26, La presa mayor)

FRYING PAN BLOWS TO THE HEAD

“Germán Barriga Muñoz, the top boss of Delfín and Army captain, never got angry; he always walked around with a smile, speaking slowly, calm and nervous at the same time. ‘How to call him?… Unreliable, that.’ A cynic.

To her, to Reinalda, they were giving it to her between Barriga and Lawrence. Gladys Calderón and Teresa Navarro were also present. I didn't know her name at that time. She was on the grill with her eyes covered by a blindfold.

She was spinning the ‘gigí,’ keep going; Barriga and Lawrence observing, asking questions, hitting her with everything they had at hand. Please, kill me, she screamed. She was in pieces. Like that, she wouldn't be able to have her child; it wouldn't be able to be born with the damage she had all over her body.

She was sure of it. So, ‘please, kill me.’ Meanwhile, he was organizing some books in the office. And Barriga and Lawrence began to laugh loudly. ‘She was asking for bullshit.’ Lawrence went to a small kitchen next to the office.

And he returned with a large frying pan. He began to hit her on the head, with violence, again and again. They were turning her into mush. Barriga had a pistol in his hand pointing at the temple of the bloodied woman, already half-gone.

A second passed, another one, he promised her he was going to kill her… he pulled the trigger. And nothing, it was a mock execution. They laughed.” (Chapter 27, Pidiendo Huevadas)

WITH A PLASTIC BAG

“He went to the dungeons. He entered Víctor Díaz's room and looked at him. He was in good health and with his clothes on. Tied by his feet and hands. ‘At that very moment, I told Díaz to forgive me for the action I was going to carry out, that is, his subsequent death.

At that instant, an agent, I don't remember who, handed me a supermarket nylon bag, which I used to cover Díaz's head, at which moment I pressed this bag to his neck in order to prevent the passage of oxygen to his body.

After about three minutes, I observed that he no longer had vital signs, at which instant I finished pressing the bag, to leave the bedroom immediately, as I was shocked by the action I had executed.’” (Chapter 26, La presa mayor. Police statement by agent Juvenal Piña regarding the crime of Communist undersecretary Víctor Díaz).

GUINEA PIGS

“That time, Colonel Contreras arrived at the barracks. He almost never went, but it was a special occasion. He was accompanied by ‘Gringo’ Michael Townley and Chiminelli. Juan Morales, Fernández Larios, Barriga, Lawrence, and several non-commissioned officers were waiting for them.

He was in the mess hall, almost at the exit door that connected to the kitchen. Everyone arrived there together. And the Peruvians too, bare-chested, blindfolded, hands handcuffed behind their backs. He began to heat the water just in case; he prepared the tray with the cups and the coffee.

Ready, willing. Two agents put the Peruvians against one of the walls of the place. Townley, the colonel, and the rest positioned themselves frontally in relation to the foreigners, at a distance of about ten meters or so. ‘Gringo’ Townley then took out a small device.

It was like a remote control with some small antennas, and he began to show the colonel how to use it. The colonel grabbed it between his hands and aimed. In an instant, the dart flew out. Before even seeing it, it was already stuck on the pit of the stomach of one of the detainees.

The colonel moved the little lever on the remote control, and the Peruvian fell immediately to the floor, struck down, writhing in a million muscle contractions, from one side to the other for a while. Those present observed the new invention and the effects of the test. The colonel moved the lever back, and the convulsions stopped.” (…) (Chapter 20, Oscuro plumaje)

Source: El Mostrador, June 23, 2012

Extermination in Simón Bolívar: the horror revealed by Manuel Contreras's "Mocito"

The story of Jorgelino Vergara, and the very existence of the Lautaro Brigade's detention and torture center, came to light through a prestigious documentary that was conceived after his official statements before the Justice system.

Over the years, dozens of military personnel involved in the Calle Conferencia case have been convicted. “It is strange that El Mocito did not end up committing suicide. It is rare that he hasn't been gunned down to this day by the bullets of old DINA or CNI comrades for being a traitor.” With those words begins La danza de los cuervos, the successful book published in 2012 by Javier Rebolledo, a journalist who was also part of the research team for the documentary El mocito, a cinematic work that initially focused on Jorgelino Vergara, who in his youth, during the times of the National Intelligence Directorate, was the waiter at the house of the leader of the dictatorship's secret police, Manuel Contreras. Not only that, because of his subsequent days in the Lautaro Brigade, Vergara ended up testifying about the atrocities inside the Simón Bolívar street barracks, a torture center described by Rebolledo as “the only barracks dedicated expressly to extermination.” According to what the book's own author related in a conversation with Ercilla magazine in October 2012, La danza de los cuervos marked a difference from other texts by “being built on the basis of the statements of the perpetrators themselves.” This situation was possible because Rebolledo had access to the secret file that included the statements of military personnel regarding the Calle Conferencia case, which affected the clandestine leadership of the Communist Party that was sent to the detention center. And in that scenario, the key statement in that file was that of the mocito who broke the pact of silence after being contacted by the PDI because another agent had blamed him in 2007 for the crime of Víctor Díaz López, deputy general secretary of the PC, who led the communists from clandestinity. All of that ended up leading to the temporary detention and the testimony of the former officers involved in what Rebolledo categorized in his book as “the brotherhood of crimes against humanity.”

TALKING ABOUT “PACKAGES”: THE MEETINGS AT MAMO CONTRERAS'S HOUSE

In July 2012, in an interview with Tomas Mosciatti for CNN Chile, Jorgelino Vergara himself addressed his history of a precarious family life and the “dazzlement” he felt once he began working, at 14 years of age, in the house of the then-colonel Contreras on Calle Pocuro at Antonio Varas. “I would open the front door, the entrance to the house, I would receive his briefcase, I would also carry his submachine gun, I would go up to the second floor, leave his submachine gun next to the nightstand, and leave his briefcase there,” he explained about his daily actions in the place.

Over the months, the adolescent waiter began to receive instruction in the use of weapons to “repel fire in case of an attack on his home.” According to his words, because of all that, he ended up being an “expert” with “good” aim, although he related that he also received self-defense instruction in karate, full contact, and the use of weapons such as katanas, nunchakus, and throwing daggers from a distance of 8 to 12 meters.

Among his most relevant statements, Vergara acknowledged that he listened to the conversations Contreras held inside the house, as he went unnoticed as part of the domestic staff. “I had no restrictions because... it was something... practically insignificant,” he recalled about his stay in the home.

That place regularly received visits from military personnel such as Miguel Krassnoff, Juan Morales Salgado, Alejandro Burgos, Marcelo Moren Brito, and Michael Townley, among others. All of them were convicted except Townley, who testified in the United States and ended up in the witness protection program. “Generally, they talked about everything related to intelligence operations (...) they talked about casualties, which were documents, for example, decisions that General Contreras made, but that in the end, Pinochet only had to sign because the facts had already been carried out,” Jorgelino stressed. He also remembered that military personnel like Moren Brito would arrive talking about “packages,” and that he soon understood that those conversations were actually related to corpses and “people who had been discharged and had to be taken to their final destinations.” On the other hand, Vergara stated that the house had an intercom to establish direct conversation with the dictator and all the DINA barracks, so once he had to receive a call from Pinochet. “Tell him his compadre is calling,” the military leader had allegedly told him. In that environment, the mocito acknowledged that the first gift of his life was received at Christmas 1975 in Contreras's home and that he even went on vacation with the family to places like the rocks of Santo Domingo and the Cajón del Maipo.

THE SIMÓN BOLÍVAR BARRACKS

Taking the alias Alejandro, in his new duties as an assistant waiter in the DINA inside the Lautaro Brigade, Jorgelino Vergara explained that upon his arrival at the barracks, he signed a contract with his real name and an attached file with a “pact of silence” that was “a kind of oath to the flag, to swear loyalty and silence about everything he saw while he was inside the intelligence services.” “[The oath ceased to be valid] when they kicked me out [in 1985], and it would not have continued to be valid because there were many situations in which I never agreed—obviously I didn't comment on it to anyone—but I did not agree with them killing people, including innocent people,” he asserted. He then added that he only revealed his apprehensions to one person, the Carabineros non-commissioned officer José Manuel Sarmiento Sotelo, and from then on they had him “in their sights.” In that vein, the most defining thing is that Jorgelino Vergara made it clear that, except for one person, “never, ever” did anyone manage to leave the Simón Bolívar barracks alive. And there he stressed that people brought to that place only lasted a couple of weeks before being murdered, with the exceptional case being that of Víctor Díaz. “I was in charge of giving them food in the dungeons, of giving them water, and, well, the torture sessions were constant, every day, [during office hours],” he affirmed about his stay in a place that, due to his socioeconomic conditions, became his residence along with two other soldiers. That is why he had to stand guard. He also stated that the tortures included hypnosis through drugs and electroshock sessions, in actions in which female DINA agents also participated. And a nurse, Lieutenant Gladys Calderón, was in charge “of delivering the coup de grâce through a lethal injection of cyanide.” Over time, the criminal ended up being convicted for her actions in Operation Condor. In another area, a relevant fact about the barracks had to do with the actions of Michael Townley, who carried out both experiments for torture, with remote-controlled electricity machines, and tests with sarin gas against Peruvian prisoners who could never be identified and who fell dead immediately. “The gas was made by Eugenio Berríos, and the Peruvians were killed with that, with a little spray tube,” the mocito stated. Finally, Vergara denied having murdered Víctor Díaz, ensuring that he only had one function. “I had no relationship with the detainees, beyond giving them food and water, but I had the unfortunate function of transporting the body... I was very fond of that Christian, because he had a resemblance to my father,” he said, pointing against two infantrymen who had to finish off the PC militant, since “El Elefante,” Juvenal Piña, did not achieve his goal through a method of asphyxiation.

DOUBTS ABOUT THE MOCITO

In the interview with Ercilla magazine, Javier Rebolledo stated that complete veracity cannot be given to the mocito's statements. “I give credibility to his childhood and youth, but subsequently, in the period of the Lautaro Brigade, I begin to contrast it with what the other agents are telling.

In the third stage of his life, when he turns 18, he distanced himself, and what he says is conditioned and relativized. He understands that he is liable; if he confesses or says things, they can prosecute him,” he stated.

Meanwhile, Marcela Said, co-director of the El mocito documentary, in a conversation with Mosciatti in July 2012, explained that she personally had a complicated view of Jorgelino. “But regardless of the degree to which one is willing to believe him, I always tell people: thanks to Jorgelino's testimony, there are people prosecuted in this case,” she expressed in a scenario where she always explained that her documentary sought to present “the ambiguity between being a victim and a perpetrator at the same time.” Finally, consider that, in April of this year, the Supreme Court ratified the conviction against 47 former DINA agents—including Miguel Krassnoff—for the qualified kidnappings of various communist leaders, including Jorge Muñoz (husband of Gladys Marín) and Waldo Pizarro (father of deputy Lorena Pizarro), and the qualified homicide of Víctor Díaz. All of that was known as the Conferencia I case. On the other hand, in June of this year, the highest court closed the convictions of another 14 former agents for the Conferencia II case.

Source: lacuarta.cl, September 11, 2023

Civic-military dictatorship used fishing company to make prisoners transformed into fishmeal disappear

It is striking that, despite suspicions of the use of the large “cookers” (ovens) of the Arauco fishing company to make corpses disappear, a detailed investigation was never carried out on the macabre use of this fish processing plant during the dictatorship.

A report from the German broadcaster WDR revealed unpublished information about the role of the Nazi Walther Rauff in the disappearance of political prisoners in Chile, applying the directive known as “Nacht und Nebel” (“Night and Fog”), issued by Adolf Hitler in 1941, which established the criteria and steps to kidnap and carry out mass disappearances.

According to the report, “Pinochet's German Godfathers,” the SS-Standartenführer and former SS officer—responsible for the murder of half a million prisoners in the Auschwitz concentration camp—introduced unprecedented disappearance practices when he advised the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) of the Chilean civic-military dictatorship between 1973 and 1990.

Rauff arrived in Chile in 1958 after having met Augusto Pinochet in Ecuador, where the latter was part of a military mission to reorganize the Ecuadorian War Academy. In our country, he dedicated himself to managing a king crab processing plant starting in the 60s, in Porvenir, Tierra del Fuego province, Magallanes region.

In parallel, he served as an agent for the German secret service, the BND. Arauco Fishing Company: The Auschwitz of the Chilean dictatorship The companies Pesquera Arauco Ltda. and Empresa Pesquera Chile Ltda. were subsidiaries of the Production Development Corporation (CORFO) and had been formed by this entity, which was dependent on the Ministry of Economy and the State Bank.

After the civic-military coup, the company began to be managed and directed by Manuel Contreras and members of the DINA, who assumed roles as board members, along with civilians of the dictatorship. The refrigerated trucks, pickup trucks, and infrastructure of the fishing company located in San Antonio were used as key logistical elements in the DINA's criminal actions and the disappearance of prisoners.

It is striking that, despite suspicions of the use of the large “cookers” (ovens) of the Arauco fishing company to make corpses disappear, using large-scale machinery to produce fishmeal through a cooking process at over 90ºC, the contents of which were subsequently pressed to eliminate leached liquids and obtain “press cake,” a detailed investigation was never carried out on the macabre use of this fish processing plant during the dictatorship.

Operation Condor and the use of the fishmeal and fish oil producing company In the WDR broadcaster's report, based on the testimony of Jorgelino Vergara, a member of the DINA who has been key in various judicial processes to reveal the existence of clandestine detention and extermination centers, such as the Simón Bolívar barracks in Peñalolén, he noted: “Everything came from Germany.

From the ex-Nazis. They brought the technology to torture, kill, and make people disappear.” Regarding Rauff, he said: “They called this man ‘The Jackal.’ He was in charge of making them disappear entirely.” The article “German broadcaster WDR reveals the role of the Nazi Walter Rauff in ‘Pinochet's German Godfathers’” by journalist Marco Fajardo of El Mostrador includes a detail not contemplated in the German broadcaster's report, by pointing out the destination of the bodies of several detainees from Londres 38 and Villa Grimaldi after being taken to the port of San Antonio.

A criminal pattern “Regarding those who passed through Londres 38, which are 85 people, they were taken out and transferred to different centers, notably Tejas Verdes and Santo Domingo, located in San Antonio.

We have investigations that account for the fact that they transferred people in sacks, already dead. That is to say, the responsibility of the fishing company is very important in relation to these disappeared persons,” according to the report.

The prisoners were transferred from the center of the capital to San Antonio aboard refrigerated trucks adapted for that purpose. These vehicles, the document notes, left from Rinconada de Maipú or from the company's premises located in Lo Valledor, in Santiago.

Once they arrived at the DINA's “Cuartel Yucatán” (Londres 38), the list of detainees carried by the drivers was read, and then they were loaded into the back of the truck, completely blindfolded. “The itinerary from Santiago to San Antonio was via Melipilla.

And from Cucumén, the road to Lo Gallardo, a bad road, where there was no one, just peasants. Next to the bridge between Santo Domingo and San Antonio, there was a military post, where they changed the driver, to continue toward the fishing company that was inside the port.

This driver with the surname ‘Tolosa,’ a military man, was the only one authorized to enter; no one stopped him. The truck took two to three hours to return, empty and cleaned.” In the report, a former detainee in San Antonio tells about Rauff's presence at the place: “And there was a warehouse where the net makers worked.

Around these parts, you could see him, where the pickup trucks with the detainees in the back were. He is the one who appears in the photo, yes. With a German accent and a bad Nazi.” Citing former DINA agents, the report indicates that the detainees were murdered at the site.

Vergara himself affirms what happened to their bodies. “They gave Rauff the position as director of the Arauco fishing company, of the dictatorship. The corpses were thrown into the Arauco fishing company's grinder.

The one who did it was The Jackal, although not personally. He was accompanied by agents from the DINA itself,” who told Vergara that “we threw them in and they were transformed into fishmeal.” El Mostrador included some of Vergara's testimonies that were not part of the radio report.

Among them, Rauff's participation in the creation of Operation Condor—the Latin American repression system to eliminate political opponents—is mentioned, in a secret meeting that took place in 1975. “I accompanied the tray where coffee, a piece of cake, and a pastry would be served for everyone who was there; there were more or less between 12 and 15.

From here went (Christoph) Willeke, who was director of the ENI, of the National Intelligence School, and this man, The Jackal, was there. He was next to Manuel Contreras, and on the other side was José María Verdeguer from Uruguay, the director of intelligence of Uruguay.

That was where they agreed on Operation Condor,” Vergara affirms. When asked if Rauff was present, he responds: “Yes, he was present. He had knowledge of everything that was agreed upon. The person was very involved in the intelligence services.” “The German connection” In the various processes of disappearance of the prisoners' bodies in the sea off San Antonio, there is a marked connection with German businessmen.

This is the case of the use of the tugboat “Kiwi,” belonging to the maritime consortium Ultramar, owned by brothers Sven and Wolf Von Appen. Subsequently, this vessel was transferred to Peru, where they renamed it “El brujo.” The patriarch of this family, Julio Alberto Von Appen, arrived in Chile in the 40s, serving as the leader of Nazi intelligence operations in Latin America, to later cement a successful path in the shipping business.

In 2013, it became known that the Von Appen family appeared as financiers of the Pinochet Foundation. According to the author of the report, after 1945, about a thousand SS, SA, and Gestapo officers arrived in Chile, being called in the DINA “our German troop.” Pesquera Arauco and Pesquera Chile had Hubert Fuchs as administrator and legal manager of the fishing company.

Fuchs, a retired sailor, was the link between the DINA and the company Standard Electric, as noted in a CIPER report published in 2009. Fuchs was a key man in the financial framework that sustained the repressive apparatus in the first years of the dictatorship.

The “final solution” and the Santiago dog crematorium In the German report, Vergara also tells what happened at the stray dog crematorium in the city of Santiago, which today is the “La Perrera” cultural center. “Look, look, they always talked to me about the packages, the packages have to be eliminated, but we have a place in Quinta Normal where it can be done so as not to leave evidence and all that bullshit: Extermination of packages.

Rauff was in charge of making them disappear entirely... It was cruel, very cruel. People were burned, human bodies in the Perrera, yes. In Santiago, there where there were more corpses, they took them to the Perrera.” When asked how many there were, he responds: “Look, to give you a number: more than 300.” This testimony was confirmed by a former worker at the stray dog crematorium, the Perrera, who from anonymity pointed out: “During the dictatorship, strange vehicles came to the place.

We couldn't stay close. The strangers threw sacks into the ovens. From what I saw from afar, the bodies in the sacks were larger than dogs.” “Simón,” who cites another former member of the DINA, indicates: “I worked at the GH (general headquarters) at this time, and he accompanied Willeke and Rauff many times visiting the Perrera in the Parque de los Reyes.

It was for dogs, but now it had to be for human beings. Rauff was in this section, I don't know, it had a name: section for the ‘final solution’ (sic).”

Source: ecoceanos.cl, September 17, 2023