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Original article: Mauricio Redolés entre las víctimas: condenan a exmarinos por 13 secuestros con grave daño en dictadura

The extraordinary visiting judge of the Valparaíso Court of Appeals, Max Cancino Cancino, delivered a landmark ruling condemning four former Navy officials for their involvement in the crimes of kidnapping with grave damage committed against thirteen individuals—among them, the renowned musician and poet Mauricio Redolés—during the early months of the civic-military dictatorship, from September 1973 to July 1974.

In the verdict, the judge imposed effective prison sentences for the four defendants, all retired from the naval institution. Juan de Dios Reyes Basaur and Héctor Vicente Santibáñez Obreque each received 12 years; Sergio Hevia Febres was sentenced to 10 years and one day; while Erwin Hugo Andrés Conn Tesche must serve 5 years and one day. All were found guilty of the 13 counts of kidnapping with severe harm to the victims, which included students, workers, social leaders, communist militants, and opponents of Augusto Pinochet’s regime, who were detained at the Silva Palma Barracks located in the Playa Ancha area.

Regarding civil reparations, the judge dismissed the prescription exceptions raised by the State and ordered a total compensation payment of 550 million pesos for moral damages to six recurring victims.

Systematized Repressive Structure

The ruling confirms the existence of a clandestine and hierarchical military organization called the Intelligence Service of the Area Command for Domestic Security, commonly referred to as SICAJSI, which operated from the coup d’état on September 11, 1973, that initiated Pinochet’s dictatorship.

According to the ruling, this body consisted of agents from various branches of national defense, particularly from the Navy, and its primary aim was the repression of opposition members. They conducted illegal arrests, transferred prisoners to facilities like ACANAV or Silva Palma Barracks, and subjected them to torture-based interrogations. By the end of 1974, this structure was renamed the Valparaíso Regional Intelligence Center (CIRE-VAL) but maintained its original objectives and methods, continuing to use the same facilities for the detention and torture of political prisoners.

The Case of Mauricio Redolés

According to the evidence, musician and poet Luis Mauricio Redolés Bustos, then a 20-year-old Law student at the University of Chile, Valparaíso campus, and a communist militant, was detained on December 10, 1973, in a university pension on Pedro Montt Avenue.

The ruling states he was taken to the Naval War Academy, where he was blindfolded and held without any legitimate judicial order.

The sailors interrogated, threatened, and tortured him through various methods, including violent blows to the stomach. Additionally, he was forced to listen to the screams and cries of other detainees who were being tortured.

Redolés was transferred between December 12 and 18 to the Buque Lebu, and then from December 19 to 30, he stayed at the Naval Academy and Silva Palma Barracks, where he was again interrogated and beaten.

He was moved to various detention centers. From December 30, 1973, to February 2, 1974, he was at the prisoner camp ‘Isla Riesco’, located in Colliguay; from February 2 to March 2, 1974, he was interned in the Naval Hospital due to a peritonitis intervention; between March 2 and 9, 1974, he was taken back to Silva Palma Barracks; from March 9 to 16 of the same year, he returned to the detention center ‘Isla Riesco’; and from that date until April 10, he was re-detained at Silva Palma Barracks. Between April 10, 1974, and June 10, 1975, he was held in the Valparaíso Public Jail.

According to the ruling, on January 7, 1975, Mauricio Redolés was subjected to a Court Martial and eventually transferred to a Police Investigations Barracks located in Santiago. He received a sentence of exile for five years to England, enforced in September 1975.

“It is also noted that the victim was placed at the disposal of the Naval Prosecutor’s Office by SICAJSI-PRIZONA in early March 1974, providing testimony before this Prosecutor’s Office in early April 1974, around four months after his detention and after any legal detention period had expired,” stated Judge Cancino in his resolution.

The Suffering of the Victims

The text of the ruling brutally details the experiences of each of the other twelve individuals who were detained and tortured by the sailors. For example, N.P.A.F., then a 17-year-old student and communist sympathizer, was arrested at his home in October 1975 by plainclothes agents. In the barracks, he was blindfolded, interrogated under blows, simulated executions, and subjected to electric shocks on his genitals and feet. He remained locked up for three weeks without being brought before any judge. “N.P.A.F. was not brought before the competent authority for the investigation of any potential crime, being released approximately three weeks later, thus exceeding any legal detention period,” noted the ruling.

Another victim was C.C.V.M., a 16-year-old girl detained twice: first on October 17, 1973, at her home, and a second time between March and April 1974 while traveling in an elevator. Agents also pressured her parents through raids. At Silva Palma Barracks, she was tortured with blows, undressed forcibly, and used to attempt to locate her sister, a MIR militant.

“C.C.V.M. was not presented to the competent authority for any potential crime investigation. Ultimately, due to the political persecution she faced, the victim left the country on April 29, 1974, heading to the United States,” the resolution stated.

Other cases detailed in the lengthy ruling include C.J. R.S., who was 17 years old when detained at the German School in Quilpué, where he was subsequently tortured with electric shocks and sexual humiliations, being released only at the end of November 1973.

Meanwhile, the communist leader C.R.R.G. was subjected to sleep deprivation, electric shocks, and forced to listen to the laments of other detainees for 17 days. J.D.P.D., a 15-year-old boy and FER sympathizer, was arrested on September 13, 1973, beaten in the former Intendancy, sent to Pisagua, then to the Maipo ship, later to Lebu, and finally imprisoned in the Valparaíso Public Jail despite his age, only being released on April 11, 1974, due to being deemed non-culpable.

The ruling also acknowledges the serious physical and psychological consequences that most victims continue to endure today, such as sleep disorders, anxiety, isolation, and in some cases, permanent physical injuries.

The ministers’ ruling adds to a long series of sentences for human rights violations committed during the dictatorship, representing an acknowledgment to the victims, including Mauricio Redolés—and their families—who have sought and demanded truth and justice for the tortures perpetrated against them by Navy officials serving the Pinochet regime.

La entrada Former Navy Officers Sentenced for Kidnappings and Torture During Chile’s Dictatorship, Including Victim Mauricio Redolés se publicó primero en El Ciudadano.