Caravan of Death Totally Explained

Everything about The Caravan Of Death totally explained

The Caravan of Death was a Chilean Army death squad that, following the Chilean coup of 1973, flew by helicopter from south to north of Chile between September 30 and October 22, 1973. During this foray, members of the squad ordered or personally carried out the execution of at least 75 individuals held in Army custody in these garrisons . Augusto Pinochet was indicted in December 2002 in this case, but he died four years later without having being judged. The trial, however, is on-going as of September 2007, other militaries and a former military chaplain having been indicted in this case.

The death squad

   The squad was made up of several Army officers and two infantrymen. They were led by Army Brigadier General Sergio Arellano, appointed by Augusto Pinochet "Official Delegate of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and President of the Government Junta." Other members included Arellano's second-in-command, Lieutenant Colonel Sergio Arredondo González, later director of the Infantry School of the Army; Major Pedro Espinoza Bravo, an Army Intelligence officer and later operations chief of the DINA secret police; Captain Marcelo Moren Brito, later commander of Villa Grimaldi, the torture camp; Lieutenant Armando Fernández Larios, later a DINA operative and involved in the assassination of Orlando Letelier (Salvador Allende's former Minister) and others .
   The group traveled from prison to prison in a Puma helicopter, inspecting military garrisons and then ordering — or carrying out themselves — the execution of the detainees, the murders being committed with small arms and bladed weapons. The victims were then buried in unmarked graves.
   Though the Rettig Commission puts the count of murdered individuals at approximately 3,000 during the 17-year Pinochet dictatorship, the deaths of these 75 individuals and the Caravan of Death episode itself are highly traumatic, especially as many of the victims had voluntarily turned themselves in to the military authorities, were all in secured military custody and posed no immediate threat because they'd no history of violence, nor were they threatening to commit any such violence.
   According to Olagier Benaventes Bustos, the second in command at the Talca Regiment when Army Brigadier Arellano landed there on September 30, 1973, the squad's aims where to instill "terror" on potential opponents as well as to insure the loyalty to the new junta of the military staff outside the capital:
Calama . Pinochet himself had been indicted by the Spanish magistrate Baltasar Garzón in 1998 after complaints presented by Victoria Saavedra(External Link

) and the Mujeres de Calama (Calama's Women), which included the Caravan of Death case investigated by Guzmán Tapia.
   On 23 May, 2000, the Court of Appeal of Santiago lifted his parliamentary immunity concerning this case, and he was indicted by Guzmán Tapia, on 1st December, 2000, as co-author of the crimes of aggravated abduction and first degree murder committed by the Caravan of Death against 75 persons. However, as soon as 11 December, 2000, the procedure was suspended by the Court of Appeal of Santiago for medical motives. In January 2001, the physicians stated that Pinochet was suffering from a "light dementia". On 8 March, 2000, the Court of Appeal confirmed Pinochet's indictement in the Caravan of Death case, but only as an "accomplice" and not as its main responsible. However, the judiciary procedures were again suspended on 9 July, 2001 because of alleged health reasons, and finally the Supreme Court invoked in 2002 a "moderate dementia" of Pinochet which enabled him not to be judged in this case
   In July 2006, the Supreme Court upheld a January 2006 judgment by the Court of Appeal of Santiago, which argued that the 2002 Supreme Court's ruling stating that Pinochet couldn't be prosecuted in the Caravan of Death case didn't apply itself to two of its victims, former bodyguards of Allende . . On 28 November, 2006, Víctor Montiglio, charged of this case, ordered Pinochet's house arrest Pinochet finally died on December 10, 2006 without having been judged in this case nor any other.
   In August 2007, a Catholic priest, Luis Jorquera, then chaplain at a military detention center set up in Chile's north after September 11, 1973, was charged with involvement in the Caravan of Death . Witnesses alleged that he'd been involved in the exhuming of the victims two years later, the corpses being then thrown out in the sea from a plane . Jorquera, who is the first priest to be charged with crimes committed during Pinochet's dictatorship, denied these accusations . Beside him, the Court of Appeals in Antofagasta charged eleven other persons of involvement in the Caravan of Death, including Army Gen Miguel Trincado and Army Maj Armando Fernandez Larios .

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