Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann (born 23 January 1938) is a

Chilean Army The Chilean Army ( es, Ejército de Chile) is the land arm of the Military of Chile. This 80,000-person army (9,200 of which are conscripts) is organized into six divisions, a special operations brigade and an air brigade. In recent years, and ...

general and a former deputy director of the DINA, the Chilean secret police under the

Augusto Pinochet Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (, , , ; 25 November 1915 – 10 December 2006) was a Chilean general who ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990, first as the leader of the Military Junta of Chile from 1973 to 1981, being declared President of ...

military dictatorship. He was in charge of a secret detention center known as '' La Venda Sexy'' ("Sexy Blindfold") and ''La Discothèque''—because of the

sexual abuse Sexual abuse or sex abuse, also referred to as molestation, is abusive sexual behavior by one person upon another. It is often perpetrated using force or by taking advantage of another. Molestation often refers to an instance of sexual assa ...

inflicted on blindfolded prisoners as loud music masked their screams. An aide to General

Manuel Contreras Juan Manuel "Mamo" Guillermo Contreras Sepúlveda (4 May 1929 – 7 August 2015) was a Chilean Army officer and the former head of the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional, National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), Chile's secret police during the ...

, head of the DINA, he was in charge of several assassinations carried out as part of

Operation Condor Operation Condor ( es, link=no, Operación Cóndor, also known as ''Plan Cóndor''; pt, Operação Condor) was a United States–backed campaign of political repression and state terror involving intelligence operations and assassination of op ...

. He has been condemned ''

in absentia is Latin for absence. , a legal term, is Latin for "in the absence" or "while absent". may also refer to: * Award in absentia * Declared death in absentia, or simply, death in absentia, legally declared death without a body * Election in ab ...

'' in Italy for the failed murder of Christian-Democrat

Bernardo Leighton Bernardo Leighton Guzmán (August 16, 1909, Negrete, Bío Bío Province – January 26, 1995, Santiago) was a Chilean Christian Democratic Party politician and lawyer. He served as minister of state under three presidents over a 36-year care ...

, and is wanted both in Spain and in Argentina. In the latter country, he is accused of the assassination of General

Carlos Prats Carlos Prats González (; February 24, 1915 – September 30, 1974) was a Chilean Army officer and politician. He served as a minister in Salvador Allende's government while Commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army. Immediately after General August ...

.Claudia Lagos and Patrick J. McDonnel
"Fugitive ex-general stirs 'dirty war' animosities in Chile"
''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...

'', 16 June 2007 In June 2007 Iturriaga went into hiding to escape a 10-year prison sentence handed down by judge Alejandro Solís (reduced to five years by the Chilean Supreme Court) for the

forced disappearance An enforced disappearance (or forced disappearance) is the secret abduction or imprisonment of a person by a State (polity), state or political organization, or by a third party with the authorization, support, or acquiescence of a state or po ...

of Revolutionary Left Movement member Luis San Martín.Un general chileno se declara en rebeldía contra un fallo que le condena a 5 años
'' El País'', 14 June 2007 He was finally captured in August 2007 in Viña del Mar.

Life and career

Raúl Iturriaga became an instructor in counter-insurgency after following courses with his future chief,

, in

Fort Gulick Fort Gulick was a United States Army base in the former Panama Canal Zone located on the Atlantic side of the Panama Canal near Fort Davis, on Gatun Lake. History The post was constructed and opened in 1941, and named for John W. Gulick, a U.S. ...

,La Gran Mentira – El caso de las "Listas de los 119" (capitulo 7)
published by

Equipo Nizkor :''See Nizkor for other organizations with a similar name.'' ---- Equipo Nizkor (from the Hebrew נִזְכּוֹר, "we will remember") is a human rights NGO concerned mostly about events in Latin America, but also Europe. It is affiliated with Der ...

an installation of the United States Department of Defense

School of the Americas The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC), formerly known as the School of the Americas, is a United States Department of Defense school located at Fort Benning in Columbus, Georgia, renamed in the 2001 National Defen ...

based in the

Panama Canal The Panama Canal ( es, Canal de Panamá, link=no) is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and divides North and South America. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a condui ...

.Raúl Iturriaga
''Memoria Viva'' He joined the DINA in November 1973, less than three months after Pinochet's coup against

Salvador Allende Salvador Guillermo Allende Gossens (, , ; 26 June 1908 – 11 September 1973) was a Chilean physician and socialist politician who served as the 28th president of Chile from 3 November 1970 until his death on 11 September 1973. He was the fir ...

. First responsible for the Department of Exterior Affairs of the DINA, he was named head of the Brigada Purén, based in the torture center

Villa Grimaldi Villa Grimaldi is considered the most important of DINA’s (Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional, the Chilean secret police during the Pinochet regime) many complexes that were used for the interrogation and torture of political prisoners during ...

, in December 1975. He attended a special military course again in Panama in 1976. Iturriaga became vice-director of intelligence in DINA in 1977, before also taking charge of its economic department, responsible for firms owned by DINA. Iturriaga was responsible for ''

Operation Colombo Operation Colombo was an operation undertaken by the DINA (the Chilean secret police) in 1975 to make political dissidents disappear. At least 119 people are alleged to have been abducted and later killed. The magazines published a list of 119 de ...

'', during which political opponents "disappeared" in Argentina while Santiago claimed they had killed themselves as a result of political in-fighting. Although he officially retired in 1991, an association of victims claims that he has maintained links with DINE, DINA's successor.

Criminal prosecution

In 1989, before the

transition to democracy Democratization, or democratisation, is the transition to a more democratic political regime, including substantive political changes moving in a democratic direction. It may be a hybrid regime in transition from an authoritarian regime to a full ...

, Iturriaga was elevated to the highest grade of general in the

Chilean Armed Forces The Chilean Armed Forces ( es, Fuerzas Armadas de Chile) is the unified military organization comprising the Chilean Army, Air Force, and Navy. The President of Chile is the commander-in-chief of the military, and formulates policy through the Mi ...

, with his base in

Iquique Iquique () is a port city and commune in northern Chile, capital of both the Iquique Province and Tarapacá Region. It lies on the Pacific coast, west of the Pampa del Tamarugal, which is part of the Atacama Desert. It has a population of 191, ...

. He officially retired in 1991 as general. The same year, he was interrogated by Minister Adolfo Bañados concerning the DINA's role in the assassination of

Orlando Letelier Marcos Orlando Letelier del Solar (13 April 1932 – 21 September 1976) was a Chilean economist, politician and diplomat during the presidency of Salvador Allende. A refugee from the Military government of Chile (1973–1990), military dictato ...

, Salvador Allende's former minister, in Washington, D.C. In 1995, Iturriaga was also sentenced to 18 years' imprisonment in Italy for the 1975 failed assassination attempt against Christian Democrat

in Rome, in part because of the testimony supplied by

Michael Townley Michael Vernon Townley (born December 5, 1942, in Waterloo, Iowa) is an American-born former agent of the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional (DINA), the secret police of Chile during the regime of Augusto Pinochet. In 1978, Townley pled guilty t ...

. In 2002, he was indicted for the "disappearance" of Víctor Olea in September 1974. The following year he was indicted by magistrate Alejandro Solís, along with his former chief

and General Pedro Espinoza, for the assassination of General

and his wife in Buenos Aires on 30 September 1974. He is also claimed by the Spanish magistrate

Baltasar Garzón Baltasar Garzón Real (; born 26 October 1955) is a former Spanish judge. Garzón formerly served on Spain's central criminal court, the ''Audiencia Nacional'', and was the examining magistrate of the ''Juzgado Central de Instrucción No. 5'', ...

. The Prats case, part of ''

'', opened up in Chile following an

extradition Extradition is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdi ...

request made by the Argentine magistrate María Servini de Cubría. The former vice-head of staff of the Chilean Army, General Guillermo Garín, who was also Pinochet's spokesman, gave his support to Iturriaga following his escape on 11 June 2007. Iturriaga had been sentenced to five years for the kidnapping of Luis Dagoberto San Martín, a 21-year-old opponent of Pinochet who "disappeared" in a DINA detention centre in 1974. In a June 2007 video broadcast, Iturriaga stated: "I openly rebel before this arbitrary, biased, unconstitutional and anti-judicial conviction." Head of DINA Manuel Contreras has been the only other general to have contested the Chilean justice during democratic rule. Contreras was on the run from justice for two months, taking refuge in the south and then in a military regiment, before being captured by security forces and detained. However, various deputies, including

Isabel Allende Isabel Angélica Allende Llona (; born in Lima, 2 August 1942) is a Chilean writer. Allende, whose works sometimes contain aspects of the genre magical realism, is known for novels such as ''The House of the Spirits'' (''La casa de los espír ...

( PS), Antonio Leal ( PPD), Tucapel Jiménez (PPD), and also Iván Moreira (

UDI Udi may refer to: Places * Udi, Enugu, a local government areas and city in Nigeria * Udi, a place in the Etawah district of Uttar Pradesh, India People * Udi Gal (born 1979), Israeli Olympic sailor * Udi Vaks (born 1979), Israeli Olympic judoka ...

), have condemned Iturriaga's flight from justice. Jiménez warned of the existence of a "network" of protectors, as did Jaime Naranjo (PS). On 2 August 2007, Iturriaga was captured in the Pacific coastal city of Viña del Mar.Claudia Lagos and Patrick J. McDonnel
Pinochet-era general is caught
''

'', 3 August 2007 Judge Alejandro Solis explained that no investigation would be opened on his disappearance, as it is not considered a crime in Chilean law to disappear when one is on

parole Parole (also known as provisional release or supervised release) is a form of early release of a prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by certain behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated parole officers, or ...

, which Iturriaga was until June 2007.Claire Martin
Arrestation d’un ancien général en fuite
'' RFI'', 3 August 2007 He was sent to the Penal Cordillera prison in the

Valparaíso Region The Valparaíso Region ( es, Región de Valparaíso, links=no, ) is one of Chile's 16 first order administrative divisions.Valparaíso Region, 2006 With the country's second-highest population of 1,790,219 , and fourth-smallest area of , ...

, located in a military property. Left-wing deputies of the ''

Concertación The Concertación, officially the Concertación de Partidos por la Democracia ( en, Coalition of Parties for Democracy), was a coalition of center-left political parties in Chile, founded in 1988. Presidential candidates under its banner won ...

'', such as Carlos Montes ( PS) and Denisse Pascal (PS), requested his transfer to the Punta Peuco prison, considered as more tightly guarded and where condemned military personnel would enjoy less freedom of action than in the military prison.Diputados concertacionistas pidieron que Punta Peuco sea la única cárcel para militares
''

La Nación ''La Nación'' () is an Argentine daily newspaper. As the country's leading conservative newspaper, ''La Nación''s main competitor is the more liberal '' Clarín''. It is regarded as a newspaper of record for Argentina. Its motto is: "''La Na ...

'', 30 July 2007 Adriana Muñoz compared the Penal Cordillera prison to the " Bermuda Triangle", because from there people disappeared just like if they had been kidnapped by

UFO An unidentified flying object (UFO), more recently renamed by US officials as a UAP (unidentified aerial phenomenon), is any perceived aerial phenomenon that cannot be immediately identified or explained. On investigation, most UFOs are id ...

s."Raúl Iturriaga Neumann ya está tras las rejas del Penal Cordillera
''

Radio Cooperativa Radio Cooperativa is a radio station in Chile, based in Santiago. It is operated by ''Compañía Chilena de Comunicaciones S.A.''. The station is notable for opposing the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship (1973–1990) and denouncing its human rights v ...

'', 2 August 2007

Francisco Encina José Francisco Encina Moriamez (born 18 December 1943) is a Chilean politician who served as President of the Chamber of Deputies and as a member of the Chamber of Deputies, representing District 8 of the Coquimbo Region The Coquimb ...

(PS) considered it strange that one of the defenders of Iturriaga, the

senator and former head of staff of the Chilean Navy, Jorge Arancibia, was a representative of the Valparaíso Region where Iturriaga has been detained. On 2 June 2017, Iturriaga was among 106 former intelligence officers who Chilean Judge Hernan Cristoso sentenced to prison for the kidnapping and murder of 16 leftist activists in 1974 and 1975.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Iturriaga, Raul 1938 births 1975 crimes in Chile Chilean Army generals Chilean assassins Chilean criminals Chilean anti-communists Chilean people of Basque descent Chilean people of German descent Chilean prisoners and detainees Dirty wars Failed assassins Living people People convicted of attempted murder People from Linares People of the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional Prisoners and detainees of Chile

Life and career

Criminal prosecution

See also

References