Original article: De los episodios más macabros de la Dictadura: Confirman condena a exoficial de Carabineros por secuestros y crímenes contra campesinos de Ñuble en 1973

Chilean Court Upholds Sentence Against Former Carabinero Official for Kidnappings and Crimes Against Farmers in Ñuble During 1973 Dictatorship

The Court of Appeals in Concepción has denied appeals against the conviction of former Carabinero official, Patricio Enrique Jeldres Rodríguez (pictured), for his involvement in a series of kidnappings and aggravated homicides committed against farmers in the municipalities of Chillán, San Nicolás, and Chillán Viejo between September and December 1973.

This case represents one of the most gruesome episodes known to have been perpetrated by agents of the Chilean state against their fellow citizens. The accounts of the torture, humiliation, and crimes committed by the Carabineros, with the complicity of right-wing civilians, remain profoundly shocking to this day.

Thus, in a unanimous ruling (case role 193-2025), the Third Chamber of the appeals court dismissed claims of legal error in the contested ruling issued by visiting judge Carlos Aldana Fuentes, which sentenced former lieutenant Patricio Enrique Jeldres Rodríguez to two sentences of 15 years and one day in effective prison time for his role in the crimes, as noted in the judicial bulletin.

The court also sentenced civilian Juan Antonio Sepúlveda Peña to 3 years and one day in prison, with the benefit of supervised release for the same period, for being an accomplice in the aggravated kidnapping.

The Facts

In the initial ruling, Judge Aldana Fuentes established the following facts:

“In the aftermath of the military coup in 1973, there was a Civil Commission at the Second Police Station in Chillán, composed of Carabineros from that police unit, led by Lieutenant Patricio Jeldres Rodríguez. Beginning September 11, 1973, this commission engaged in the illegal detention of political opponents of the military regime without any judicial or administrative orders, some of whom were subjected to torture during interrogations and subsequently executed or made to disappear—actions that were thoroughly unlawful and linked by the investigation led by the visiting judge with various other cases.

1).- Around 5:00 PM on September 18, 1973, a Carabinero patrol consisting of Herminio Fernández Mercado (deceased), Juan Francisco Opazo Guerrero (deceased), Rodolfo Marqués Riquelme Echeverría (deceased), and Pedro Loyola Osorio (deceased) arrived at the home of Gabriel Marcelo Cortez Luna, located at Pabellón Manuel Rodríguez, No. 107 in Chillán. They entered without any judicial or administrative warrant, violently searching the home for Jorge Cortez Luna (the brother of Gabriel), who was not present. They proceeded to detain Gabriel Marcelo and Pedro Eduardo Cortez Luna, transporting them to the Second Carabinero Station in Chillán, where they were interrogated and tortured by officers under Lieutenant Jeldres’s command.

While detained at the police station, Pedro Cortez Luna was recognized by the lieutenant, with whom he shared schooling at Chillán Men’s High School. This led to his immediate release, while Gabriel Marcelo Cortez Luna remained detained in another cell.

At 8:30 AM the next day, September 19, 1973, Carabineros from the Zañartu Population Post found an unidentified body on Lazareto Street, in front of the ‘Dinac’ warehouses in Chillán. The body displayed a gunshot wound to the back and left lung, according to the police report, which caused death, as certified by the death certificate. The investigation established that the body belonged to GABRIEL MARCELO CORTEZ LUNA, who was buried in a common grave at the Chillán Cemetery, without notifying his family, who searched for him in vain.

After extensive inquiries, on October 18, 1973, his mother and brother found his body at the local cemetery and transferred it to a family grave.

2.- On October 1, 1973, around 11:00 AM, Ricard Troncoso León, alias ‘Gonzalo Román’, was at his home in the El Tejar community, with his wife and young daughter when a patrol from the Second Police Station, led by Lieutenant Jeldres, arrived in a Carabinero jeep alongside a civilian. They proceeded to invade the residence and detain him without any judicial or administrative orders, taking him to the aforementioned police station, where he was tortured. His family was misinformed, with the police telling his spouse that he had been transferred to the regiment on October 3, 1973, which was untrue, leaving his location unknown from that point onward.

3.- At around 4:00 PM on October 11, 1973, a squad of Carabineros from the Second Police Station, led by a lieutenant and armed with submachine guns, traveled to San Nicolás, coordinated and awaited by local Carabineros under the orders of the same officer.

They continued to the ‘Ranquil’ Peasant Settlement—now the Victoria estate—managed by a workers’ committee on the expropriated estate, where they held the workers present, interrogating several of them under torture for several hours—submerging them in a water tank, applying electric shocks, and beating them severely, causing their bodies to bleed—all in front of their families, including minors. Later, during dusk, they took the detained Gustavo Efraín Domínguez Jara, Wilson Alfredo Becerra Cifuentes, and Tomás Rogelio Domínguez Jara, bound in a police vehicle, to the El Ala Bridge over the Ñuble River; they were last seen alive there, at which time no further news of their whereabouts was received.

4.- At 10:00 PM on October 1, 1973, a Carabinero patrol arrived at a residence in Pabellones Pizarro, street six, house four, in Chillán, proceeding to detain Patricio Lautaro Weitzel Pérez, Arturo Lorenzo Prat Martí, and José Gregorio Retamal Velásquez without any judicial or administrative warrants, taking them to the Second Police Station, where they were interrogated and tortured by the aforementioned Carabinero operational group, led by a lieutenant of that police unit.

Later, on December 24, 1973, a young woman entered the jewelry store owned by don Mario Weitzel Trincado—the father of Patricio Lautaro Weitzel Pérez—to repair a wristwatch, and upon realizing that the item belonged to his missing son, Patricio Lautaro, he discreetly followed her, leading him to a nearby area where he found the bodies of six individuals floating on the Ñuble River, including his son Patricio. The father rescued him and left him half-buried on the same land, later reporting the matter to the court on December 26, 1973. A criminal case was formed, and the judge arrived at the location, ordering the body to be retrieved and transported to the morgue for autopsy before being returned to the family for burial.

Concerning the victims Arturo Lorenzo Prat Martí and José Gregorio Retamal Velásquez, since their detention and transport to the Second Carabinero Station in Chillán, there has been no credible news regarding their whereabouts or location.

5.- Around 10:00 AM on September 25, 1973, Robinson Enrique Ramírez del Prado, president of the Chillán Single Workers’ Central, was detained by a group of Carabineros from the Second Police Station at the ‘El Cóndor’ tannery located at Av. Collín No. 866, Chillán, in the presence of his boss (Juan León Bernier) and coworkers, and taken to the aforementioned police unit, where he was seen entering by his cousin Gerardo Pradenas del Prado, at that time a Carabinero officer in the same police station, who confirmed their family ties. He was later interrogated under torture.

At 1:00 PM on September 26, 1973, Leopoldo López Rivas was detained at his shoe repair workshop located at the intersection of Av. Brasil and Av. Libertad in Chillán, without any legal order, in the presence of his assistant Vicente Vidal Méndez, and was taken to the aforementioned police unit where his detention was acknowledged by the duty Carabineros, whose entry was recorded; Rosario Peña Espinoza came to that place at 3:00 PM on that same day.

It is also documented that both detainees—Robinson Ramírez del Prado and Leopoldo López Rivas—were subjected to intense and cruel torture, leaving them in very poor physical condition. In this state, they were taken by the Carabinero squad from the Second Police Station, led by Lieutenant Jeldres, and loaded into a police vehicle, from which point no news has been heard regarding their whereabouts or location.

6.- At around 11:45 PM on September 23, 1973, Juan Mauricio Poblete Tropa was detained while sleeping at his parents’ home when a group of Carabineros, led by Lieutenant Patricio Jeldres Rodríguez—who had requested support from military personnel passing by—entered violently without a judicial or administrative order and transported him to the Second Police Station in Chillán. His mother, María Sabina Poblete Tropa, observed him upon a visit to the station, noticing he had been severely beaten.

On September 27, 1973, while his mother was bringing him lunch at the police station, she saw him being loaded into a van. When she inquired about his destination, she was told he was being taken to the Regiment, a place he never arrived.

Since that day, the family lost all contact regarding his whereabouts, until they learned from Mario Weitzel Trincado that, on December 24, 1973, he had found the body of his son near the El Ala Bridge along with other skeletal remains; one of which caught his attention for lacking a head but had a foot with a sock and shoe, which he kept. Later, Juan Poblete Tropa’s mother recognized the items as belonging to her son.

Upon conducting forensic genetic examinations, and from the integrated laboratory report GMI incorporated into the case on September 23, 2019, it was established with a probability of at least 99.99997% that the left femur—the body of which had the retrieved sock and shoe—labeled 62, belongs to the victim identified as Juan Mauricio Poblete Tropa, leading to the corresponding death registration with the Civil Registry, citing the cause of death as indeterminate.

7.- At around midnight on October 1, 1973, Mario Fernando Moreno Castro, a leader of the Socialist Party, was at his home on Cabildo Street No. 441, Chillán Viejo (the residence shared with his wife Rosa Elba Salinas Farías and their 3-year-old daughter, who were not present at the time), when he became aware that his house was being raided by Carabinero officials.

He chose to flee through the back fence of the property, crossing the interior yards of his neighbors. At the intersection of Juan Martínez de Rozas and Cabildo streets, he was aided by doña Mónica Muñoz Orellana, who saw him walk down the street holding a white handkerchief on his shoulder, revealing to her that he was escaping from the raid and intended to surrender to the Carabineros at the 2nd Police Station.

Given the circumstances of the time and the prevailing curfew, doña Mónica brought him into the restaurant where she worked (‘Sociedad Mutualista Bernardo O’Higgins’), located a half-block from Moreno Castro’s home, where he hid for the entire night.

Around 6:00 AM, Mario Moreno Castro left the restaurant, expressing his intent to surrender to the 2nd Police Station. Before leaving, he left his belongings with the request that they be delivered to his wife. When opening the door, doña Mónica encountered a Carabinero jeep, conversing with Carabinero Troncoso (deceased), whom she knew because the restaurant served as a boarding house for local Carabineros. She asked why they were there so early, and Carabinero Troncoso mentioned that “a little bird had escaped but was nearby.” After the patrol left, Mario Moreno Castro departed with the intention of surrendering to the Carabineros.

On the morning of October 2, 1973, when Rosa Elba Salinas Farías returned home after her shift at Chillán Hospital, she noticed her home had been raided, and neighbors informed her that her partner had been detained that morning by patrols near their home. She went looking for him at the 2nd Police Station in Chillán where, at first, she was told that Mario Moreno was being held, but subsequently, the Carabinero officials denied this information.

However, witnesses have confirmed that several people were detained along with Moreno Castro and reported seeing him being interrogated under torture before being removed from the police unit by the interrogators, from which point all news regarding his whereabouts or destination has vanished,” concludes Judge Carlos Aldana’s investigation.

Read the full ruling HERE

The Citizen