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Judi Lynn

(160,524 posts)
Mon Jun 30, 2014, 10:27 PM Jun 2014

Chilean Court Rules U.S. Had Role in Murders

Source: New York Times

Chilean Court Rules U.S. Had Role in Murders
By PASCALE BONNEFOY JUNE 30, 2014

SANTIAGO, Chile — The United States military intelligence services played a pivotal role in setting up the murders of two American citizens in 1973, providing the Chilean military with the information that led to their deaths, a court here has ruled.

The recent court decision found that an American naval officer, Ray E. Davis, alerted Chilean officials to the activities of two Americans, Charles Horman, 31, a filmmaker, and Frank Teruggi, 24, a student and an antiwar activist, which led to their arrests and executions.

The murders were part of an American-supported coup that ousted the leftist government of President Salvador Allende. The killing of the two men was portrayed in the 1982 film “Missing.”

The ruling by the judge, Jorge Zepeda, now establishes the involvement of American intelligence officials in providing information to their Chilean counterparts. He also charged a retired Chilean colonel, Pedro Espinoza, with the murders, and a civilian counterintelligence agent, Rafael González, as an accomplice in Mr. Horman’s murder.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/01/world/americas/chilean-court-rules-us-had-role-in-murders.html?_r=0

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Chilean Court Rules U.S. Had Role in Murders (Original Post) Judi Lynn Jun 2014 OP
My journalist husband was murdered because he knew too much about Pinochet's US backers. Judi Lynn Jun 2014 #1
Can we perp walk Henry Kissinger? Puleeze? McCamy Taylor Jun 2014 #2
That would be looking backwards - only Republicans are allowed to do that when they sue the Presiden grahamhgreen Jul 2014 #6
Ray E. Davis Octafish Jun 2014 #3
Extradite Kissinger nt geek tragedy Jun 2014 #4
Don't be coy..... DeSwiss Jul 2014 #5
Don't forget Henry's pal, Milton Friedman! Joe Bacon Jul 2014 #11
Thank you Judi Lynn !!!! SamKnause Jul 2014 #7
Thanks to you, Sam Knause. n/t Judi Lynn Jul 2014 #13
Pinochete is Hank's legacy Botany Jul 2014 #8
K & R n/t xocet Jul 2014 #9
Death of one of Pinochet's torturers, Osvaldo Romo: Judi Lynn Jul 2014 #10
This was not an isolated incident . . FairWinds Jul 2014 #12
Our own corporate media, even then, went to great lengths to keep US citizens from awareness Judi Lynn Jul 2014 #15
Kicked and recommended. Uncle Joe Jul 2014 #14
Thank you, Uncle Joe. n/t Judi Lynn Jul 2014 #16

Judi Lynn

(160,524 posts)
1. My journalist husband was murdered because he knew too much about Pinochet's US backers.
Mon Jun 30, 2014, 10:36 PM
Jun 2014

Justice for Charles Horman – and the truth about the US and Chile's coup

My journalist husband was murdered because he knew too much about Pinochet's US backers. Accountability is 40 years overdue

Joyce Horman
theguardian.com, Wednesday 11 September 2013 07.30 EDT

Forty years ago, during Chile's bloody coup of 11 September 1973, my husband, Charles Horman, stepped into a car driven by "Captain" Ray Davis, the head of the US military group in Chile, for a ride from the coastal resort town of Viña del Mar to the capital of Santiago. That one journey forever changed our family, and placed me on a quest for justice that persists to this day.

Charlie was a journalist, and we both were enthusiastic supporters of the democratically-elected socialist president, Salvador Allende. When General Augusto Pinochet launched his coup against Allende from the same coastal town Charles was visiting, my husband was surprised to see not only many Chilean tanks and helicopters moving out, but US warships cruising just off the coast, and US military personnel on the ground. He overheard some of those personnel enthusiastically and eagerly taking credit for the success of the coup, implying US military involvement. Charlie dutifully took his notes.

Before he, and our visiting friend from New York, Terry, began their journey with Davis, Charles knew he had come upon dangerous information. The drive past heavy military roadblocks into the heart of Santiago where Pinochet's forces were on a search-and-destroy mission for Allende supporters, provided the perfect opportunity for Davis to evaluate Charles and his loyalties. This reality did not escape my husband, and he began to fear Captain Davis.

Charles returned to our home in Santiago, and as he recounted his journey and discoveries to me, we resolved to leave the country. On 17 September, we separately embarked on our errands for the day, and kissed each other goodbye. I did not realize at the time that I would never see my husband alive again.

More:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/11/justice-charles-horman-us-chile-coup

Octafish

(55,745 posts)
3. Ray E. Davis
Mon Jun 30, 2014, 11:26 PM
Jun 2014

I am disgusted to write the US Government today still employs murdering, torturing, gangsters in its never ending war on democracy.


 

DeSwiss

(27,137 posts)
5. Don't be coy.....
Tue Jul 1, 2014, 12:09 AM
Jul 2014

...you can go ahead and name names. Other than just the lowly messengers.

- No one's forgotten what a pivotal role you played Henry......

Exhibit #1:



K&R

Joe Bacon

(5,164 posts)
11. Don't forget Henry's pal, Milton Friedman!
Tue Jul 1, 2014, 08:36 AM
Jul 2014

Friedman and his Chicago Boys made Chile their laboratory for their perverted pleasure.

Judi Lynn

(160,524 posts)
10. Death of one of Pinochet's torturers, Osvaldo Romo:
Tue Jul 1, 2014, 04:48 AM
Jul 2014

Infamous Pinochet-era torturer dies in Chile
Wed Jul 4, 2007 3:29PM EDT

SANTIAGO, July 4 (Reuters) - A notorious Chilean agent who confessed to torturing political opponents during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet died on Wednesday having served five years in prison for human rights abuses.
Osvaldo Romo, known as "El Guaton" (The fat one), died of heart failure in a prison hospital in the Chilean capital Santiago at 4:45 a.m. (0845 GMT), the hospital said in a statement. He was 69.
Romo was an officer in the DINA, the intelligence service set up by Pinochet after he seized power in a military coup in 1973.

The coup ushered in 17 years of dictatorship in Chile during which nearly 3,200 died in political violence, the vast majority killed by Pinochet's men. A further 28,000 were tortured and thousands fled into exile.

Romo worked at Santiago's Villa Grimaldi, the most notorious of the DINA's detention centers.

Michelle Bachelet, Chile's current president and a longtime opponent of the Pinochet regime, was briefly detained at the center in the 1970s.

Survivors of Villa Grimaldi described Romo as a sadistic and psychopathic torturer, and in television interviews conducted from prison in recent years, the rotund former officer openly discussed his torture techniques.
"He felt satisfied with what he'd done because his view was that at that moment in history his country needed his services, and that made him happy," Romo's former defense lawyer, Enrique Ibarra, told reporters on Wednesday.

More:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/07/04/idUSN04371134

[center]

Osvaldo Romo[/center]
Romo has his own Wikipedia:
~snip~
Osvaldo Romo made himself known in working classes' neighborhoods before Pinochet's coup in 1973 as a leftist activist, member of the Partido Socialista Popular and sympathizant of the MIR <1>. Following the coup, he reappeared in these neighborhoods with a military uniform, arresting his friends and contacts. Left-wing circles still debate to know if he suddenly changed political orientation or if he always was a mole for the security services <1>.

. . .

Excerpt from a Univision interview:

—Would you do it again? Would you do it the same way?

—Sure, I'd do the same and more. I wouldn't leave anybody alive (...) That was one of DINA's mistakes. I was always arguing with my general: don't leave that person alive, don't let that person go free. There are consequences.

—As for throwing the corpses of the prisoners into the sea...

—I think it could have happened. (...) Throwing them into the crater of a volcano would be better... (...) Who'd go looking for them in a volcano? Nobody.

—On the day you die... what would your epitaph say? "Here lies the hangman, the torturer, the murderer..."

—Logical, logical. I accept that. But for me it was a positive thing. (...) I am at peace with my conscience and my beliefs.

– Extract from the interview, Wikipedia

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osvaldo_Romo

[center]

Villa Grimaldi



President Michelle Bachelet & her mother were both imprisoned and tortured here.
Her father, General Alberto Bachelet, died in prison after relentless torture, died for
his allegiance to the elected President of Chile, Salvador Allende, his commander in chief.



Tower (torture)[/center]
Villa Grimaldo, Wikipedia

~snip~
For most of the 19th and 20th centuries, the three-acre estate was a gathering place for many of Chile’s artists and intellectuals. Over the years Villa Grimaldi’s various owners hosted parties and cultural events. The structures included meeting rooms, entertainment halls, and a theater, as well as a school that was open to the entire community. It was a gathering place for many left wing and progressive cultural and political figures during the Popular Unity years, the period associated with the election of Salvador Allende, a Socialist, to Chile’s presidency in 1970.[1]

This liberal atmosphere changed suddenly when General Augusto Pinochet seized power in a military coup d’etat on September 11, 1973. Chile’s wealthy oligarchy, the Nixon administration, and the Central Intelligence Agency were among the supporters of Allende’s overthrow. The owner of Villa Grimaldi at the time of the coup, Emile Vassallo, was pressured to sell the estate to the new government in order to protect his family.[2] This is one of the first examples of the state of siege that was enforced under Pinochet for the next 17 years. His regime began to detain thousands of political activists, students, workers, trade unionists, and any other subversive individuals who spoke out against his fascist military government.[3]

Villa Grimaldi was taken over by the DINA, Pinochet’s secret police, under Colonel Manuel Contreras and became an interrogation center under the cover of an electrical utility company. It was referred to by the government as Cuartel Terranova, but continued to be referred to as Villa Grimaldi by the greater population.

An estimated 4,500 people were detained at Villa Grimaldi, and of those at least 226 were “disappeared” forever.[4] Victims included Carlos Lorca, the British physician Sheila Cassidy, the MAPU leader Juan Maino, the CEPAL diplomat Carmelo Soria, and the President of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, who was tortured with her mother.[5] Prisoners were supposedly detained for interrogation but their detention usually lasted for long periods of time without explanation and many prisoners were subject to torture. According to the Rettig Report, they were kept in several different living situations: The Tower, a tall structure containing ten narrow spaces measuring 70 x 70 centimetres and two metres high in which multiple prisoners were held. The tower also contained a torture chamber. Apparently, people brought to the tower were detainees considered to be of some importance and whose stage of intense interrogation had finished. Many prisoners who went to the tower were never seen again. Chile Houses were wooden structures designed for solitary confinement. They consisted of vertical sections similar to closets in which the person had to remain standing in darkness for several days. Corvi Houses were small wooden rooms built inside a larger room, each containing a bunkbed. This was supposedly where prisoners stayed while they were undergoing intense interrogation and torture.[6]

The forced voyeurism exercised at Villa Grimaldi has been likened to places like Abu Ghraib.[3] Electric shock was the most common form of torture used by agents at Villa Grimaldi. Agents tied naked prisoners to a bare metal bed known as la parilla, or the grill, and shock devices were attached to sensitive parts of the body such as the lips or genitals.[7] Other torture methods included hanging, underwater asphyxiation, beatings, burning, verbal abuse and general degradation. Detainees were sometimes drugged and hypnotized during interrogations.[6]

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Grimaldi

 

FairWinds

(1,717 posts)
12. This was not an isolated incident . .
Tue Jul 1, 2014, 12:17 PM
Jul 2014

Although it is not as well known or documented
the US empire directed the overthrow of democracy
in Brazil in 1964. This year marks the 50th anniversary.
White House transcripts starting in 1962 (see National Security Archive)
reveal the Kennedy's utter contempt for Brazilian self determination.
Never forget.

Judi Lynn

(160,524 posts)
15. Our own corporate media, even then, went to great lengths to keep US citizens from awareness
Wed Jul 2, 2014, 01:11 AM
Jul 2014

of the gross atrocities the US was supporting in Brazil.

Some members of the Catholic clergy collected testimonies from former prisoners who were tortured relentlessly, and compiled them in a book "Nunca Mais" (Never Again) which has been widely read after the military dictatorship.

[center][/center]

The current President of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, was herself arrested, imprisoned and tortured relentlessly, as well. Here's a photo taken of her in a courtroom. Notice the military judges are covering their faces so they won't be easily identified.

[center]

She was the only one there who didn't appear to try to hide her face. [/center]
[center]

The Pau de Arara (The Parrot's Perch), one of the torture methods
employed by the Brazilian Military Dictatorship, supported by our country.
It must be remembered that the Pau de Arara was originally employed by
early Portuguese landowners to punish their African slaves when they felt
they wanted to terrorize them.



A public monument memorializing the suffering of the political prisoners
during the Brazilian Military Dictatorship. It's on display in Recife, Brazil. [/center]

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