Former Chilean intelligence agents sentenced to fifteen years for murder in Washington
Three former members of the DINA were sentenced as responsible for the homicide of a US citizen that occurred in 1976 in the American capital, in an attack where former minister Orlando Letelier also died.
Former Chilean intelligence agents sentenced to fifteen years for murder in Washington
A judge from the Court of Appeals of Santiago handed down a fifteen-year prison sentence against three men who were part of the former Chilean secret police. Pedro Espinoza, José Zara and Raúl Iturriaga were found guilty of the aggravated homicide of Ronni Moffitt.
The victim, a young US citizen, died on 21 September 1976 when a bomb exploded in the car in which she was travelling through the streets of Washington D.C. In that same attack, Orlando Letelier died, who had been foreign minister during the government of Salvador Allende.
Judge Paola Plaza, in charge of cases involving human rights violations, determined that the crime was part of a strategy of eliminations ordered by the DINA under the command of Manuel Contreras. The ruling states that this structure carried out other attacks abroad, such as those against Bernardo Leighton in Italy in 1975 and Carlos Prats in Argentina in 1974.
Espinoza and Zara already have more than one hundred previous sentences for crimes against fundamental rights committed during the period of military dictatorship.
Data obtained from CIPER Chile
Source: Google News CL — Crime