Musician and community leader Victor Jara was murdered and tortured during the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship, a regime that persecuted him. Photo: Europa Press
Hernan Carlos Chacon SotoA retired Chilean army brigadier and one of seven former officers was sentenced to 25 years in prison last Monday for his involvement in the torture and murder. Victor Zara Y Litter Quiroga He committed suicide on Tuesday, August 29, 1973. The incident took place minutes before he was arrested and transferred Puntayuco PrisonThere he will begin serving his sentence.
According to local press, units of the Human Rights Unit of the Chilean Defense Force arrived this morning to arrest him at his home in the capital’s Los Condes commune. It was at this moment that the 86-year-old ex-officer asked for medicine and used the moment to attempt his own life.
Chacon Soto’s security was maintained during the long operation, in those days during the brutal repression following the coup led by Augusto Pinochet, the brigadier performed only the function of guarding the outer perimeter of the Chilean grounds. Nearly 5,000 people who had been detained until September 11 thronged the stadium. Five days later, Victor Jara was assassinated in the same Colossus.
However, the verdict made public on Monday assured him that he had tactical and intelligence knowledge, “conditions that allow him to directly intervene in the development of investigations” carried out in the locker room, “as well as in the previous process of classifying prisoners.” , they noted.
According to the argument, he participated in the decision to separate who was taken for trial, and finally, “there is all the evidence that there was an order imposed by a strict structure inside the Chilean stadium, their final destination. The order is there”.
“Many testimonies confirmed that he participated in the selection process and reported it to his superiors, which is why his claim that he only protected the outer perimeter of the envelope is not credible or credible. It is not consistent with his high rank, or with the various elements of confidence collected,” the sentence adds.
“At that time, he was in possession of a 9-millimeter Steyr gun, weapons that, according to forensic records, fully corresponded to the technical description of the injuries that caused the death of Zara Martinez and Litre Quiroga,” he concluded.
Who were Victor Zara’s killers?
According to a ruling by Chile’s Supreme Court, the seven people involved in Victor Jara’s murder are the following former soldiers:
- Raul Jofre Gonzalez
- Edwin Timder Bianchi
- Nelson Haas Massey
- Ernesto Bethke Wolff
- Juan Zara Quintana
- Hernan Chacon Soto
- Rolando Humberto Camilo Melo Silva
Who is Victor Zara?
Victor Jara was a Chilean musician and social activist who was abducted, tortured and later assassinated by soldiers participating in the coup d’état imposed by Augusto Pinochet.
Zara was part of the protest against the assassination of Salvador Allende at the Palacio de la Moneda.
