Chile Indicts Ex-U.S. Officer in 1973 Killings
By PASCALE BONNEFOY
SANTIAGO, Chile — A Chilean judge indicted a former United States Navy
officer on Tuesday in the killings of two United States citizens shortly
after a 1973 military coup here.
The former naval officer, Capt. Ray E. Davis, was commander of the United States Military Group at the embassy here and is accused of providing Chilean military intelligence agents with information on the United States citizens Charles Horman and Frank Teruggi, who were detained in the aftermath of the coup led by Gen. Augusto Pinochet and were killed while in custody.
The ruling by the judge, Jorge Zepeda, draws heavily upon scores of United States government documents that were declassified in 1999. It says Captain Davis did not prevent the murders of the two men, “although he was in a position to do so, given his coordination with Chilean agents.” Judge Zepeda asked the Supreme Court to authorize a request for his extradition.
Pedro Espinoza, a former Chilean army colonel who is serving multiple sentences for other human rights crimes, was also indicted in the homicides. In 2003, Judge Zepeda indicted a civilian counterintelligence agent, Rafael González, in the death of Mr. Horman.
A statement issued Tuesday by an embassy spokesman said the United States government “continues to support a thorough investigation into the Horman and Teruggi deaths in order to bring those responsible to justice.” It added that State Department policy precludes comment on “specific extradition matters.”
Mr. Horman, 31, a filmmaker and journalist, had settled in Chile in 1972 with his wife after traveling around Latin America. At the time of his arrest, he was researching a political murder and writing scripts for documentaries. Mr. Teruggi, 24, a graduate of the California Institute of Technology, was an economics student at the University of Chile. They were collaborating in a weekly news digest.
The Horman case inspired the award-winning 1982 film “Missing” by the director Costa-Gavras.
Information about Captain Davis’s current whereabouts was not immediately available. In February 2000, The New York Times reported, “Captain Davis, now 74 and retired, said in a recent interview that he had nothing to do with the deaths and he appeared offended by the resurgence of questions about the killings.”
Late Tuesday, Mr. Teruggi’s sister, Janis Teruggi Page, issued a statement on behalf of herself and Mr. Horman’s wife that said: “I, along with Joyce Horman, am looking forward to understanding the evidence behind these indictments. The fact that Judge Zepeda has spent considerable time investigating and evaluating these cases gives me hope that finally the truth will be revealed about their murders, and justice will be achieved.”
The former naval officer, Capt. Ray E. Davis, was commander of the United States Military Group at the embassy here and is accused of providing Chilean military intelligence agents with information on the United States citizens Charles Horman and Frank Teruggi, who were detained in the aftermath of the coup led by Gen. Augusto Pinochet and were killed while in custody.
The ruling by the judge, Jorge Zepeda, draws heavily upon scores of United States government documents that were declassified in 1999. It says Captain Davis did not prevent the murders of the two men, “although he was in a position to do so, given his coordination with Chilean agents.” Judge Zepeda asked the Supreme Court to authorize a request for his extradition.
Pedro Espinoza, a former Chilean army colonel who is serving multiple sentences for other human rights crimes, was also indicted in the homicides. In 2003, Judge Zepeda indicted a civilian counterintelligence agent, Rafael González, in the death of Mr. Horman.
A statement issued Tuesday by an embassy spokesman said the United States government “continues to support a thorough investigation into the Horman and Teruggi deaths in order to bring those responsible to justice.” It added that State Department policy precludes comment on “specific extradition matters.”
Mr. Horman, 31, a filmmaker and journalist, had settled in Chile in 1972 with his wife after traveling around Latin America. At the time of his arrest, he was researching a political murder and writing scripts for documentaries. Mr. Teruggi, 24, a graduate of the California Institute of Technology, was an economics student at the University of Chile. They were collaborating in a weekly news digest.
The Horman case inspired the award-winning 1982 film “Missing” by the director Costa-Gavras.
Information about Captain Davis’s current whereabouts was not immediately available. In February 2000, The New York Times reported, “Captain Davis, now 74 and retired, said in a recent interview that he had nothing to do with the deaths and he appeared offended by the resurgence of questions about the killings.”
Late Tuesday, Mr. Teruggi’s sister, Janis Teruggi Page, issued a statement on behalf of herself and Mr. Horman’s wife that said: “I, along with Joyce Horman, am looking forward to understanding the evidence behind these indictments. The fact that Judge Zepeda has spent considerable time investigating and evaluating these cases gives me hope that finally the truth will be revealed about their murders, and justice will be achieved.”
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