Operation Massacre (15 page)

 

33.
Fernández Suárez Confesses

—
There are charges here —
exclaimed Lieutenant Colonel Fernández Suárez—
but no proof!

It was eleven o'clock on the morning of December
18
,
1956
. The Governance Minister and the six members of the Province Advisory Board had come together in a secret session; they were listening to the Chief of Police's response to Schaposnik's accusations:

—A number of circumstances are being referred to here —proceeded Fernández Suárez with passion in his voice,— but there's no talk of who is creating them, when they took place, what evidence might exist . . . 
There needs to be proof, because if there isn't, the Chief of Police should be singled out as well!

What happens next is very strange. Up until this moment, there is actually no proof of the secret execution. There is only Livraga's formal accusation against “whoever was responsible” and Fernández Suárez's statements, which have been buried in the June
1956
newspapers, and which no one has thought to look for. But now it is the Chief of Police himself who, compelled by a dark, self-incriminating fate, confirms and expands upon those statements.

So it is he who provides the necessary proof.

At this time I would like to ask the reader to disbelieve all the claims I have made, to distrust the sound of the words, the possible language games that any journalist turns to when he wants to prove something, and to believe only the parts of my story that match what Fernández Suárez has said.

Begin by doubting the very existence of those men whom, according to my account, the Chief of Police in Florida arrested on the night of June
9
,
1956
. Now listen to Fernández Suárez before the Advisory Board on December
18
,
1956
, as per the stenographic transcription:

With respect to Mister Livraga, I want to make known that on the night of June 9 I received the order to raid a house in person . . . on that property I found fourteen people . . . among them was this man.

So those people existed, and among them was Livraga. But I have claimed that he arrested those men
before
martial law was put into effect. And to determine the time at which it was instated, I have not limited myself to consulting the newspapers of June
10
,
1956
, which unanimously report that it was announced at
12
:
30
a.m. of that day. I have gone beyond that by locating the State Radio registry book of announcers and photocopying it to prove, to the minute, that martial law was made public at
12
:
32
a.m. on June
10
.

And when I maintain that the Chief of Police arrested those men an hour and a half prior, and technically a day early, that is to say at
11
:
00
p.m. on June
9
, the reader should not take my word for it, but rather that of the Chief of Police before the Advisory Board:

At 11:00 p.m. I raided the property in person . . .

And when I say that those men did not participate in the rebellion of June
9
,
1956
, the reader should doubt me more than ever. But believe Fernández Suárez when he states:

. . . these people . . . were about to participate in these acts . . .

Were about to
. That is to say, had not participated.

I have said, moreover, that those men did not put up any resistance. And Fernández Suárez says:

. . . they did not have time to resist . . .

Whether it was because they did not have the time or because they did not think to do it, what we know is that they did not resist.

I don't want to be accused of Jesuitically extracting the segment of Fernández Suárez's report that refers to Livraga's case and of making him say something he didn't say. I am going to reproduce it here unabridged because what it constitutes—rather than a defense—is the very proof that he was demanding.

With respect to this Mister Livraga, I would like to make known that on the night of June
9
I received the order to raid a house in person where General Tanco was meeting with the leaders of the group that were going to attack the Mechanics School. At
11
:
00
p.m. I raided that property in person. I was half an hour late; if I had done it a bit earlier, I would have arrested General Tanco. I found fourteen people on that property who did not have time to resist—they were armed with Colt pistols—because we came in through the doors and the windows. Among them was that man. When I found out about what was happening in La Plata, I went to Headquarters and placed these men in the commissioner's custody. At dawn, the Executive Power ordered the execution of these people who were about to participate in these acts or who had adopted some kind of revolutionary attitude.

The reader will observe that, in addition to the points of convergence between the two versions, the first discrepancies begin to emerge. From a legal perspective, these discrepancies are unimportant. Yet it is worth noting that the Chief of Police of the Province has not yet found, nor will he find, witnesses who saw ex-General Tanco inside that house. He also has not shown, nor will he be able to show, that those men were armed with Colt pistols. Because here, indeed—to recall his apt phrase—there are charges, but no proof.

This man —Fernández Suárez went on— fled the police. Subsequently, the father sent a telegram to the President of the Republic saying that his son had been admitted to a hospital, seriously injured by the police. If the police had wanted to kill him, they would not have left him wounded, seeing how there was already an order out for his execution. Thus, he escaped. Afterward, during that confusing night, his actions and whereabouts remain unknown. He can say that the police injured him, but it's strange that, given the existence of an order for execution, they didn't execute him.

Fernández Suárez's version of the particular case of Livraga is simply childish. He tries to make them believe that Livraga wasn't a part of the execution. But rising up in opposition to the solitary word of Fernández Suárez is not only the overwhelming circumstantial evidence—which includes Livraga's scars, the receipt issued in his name by the same San Martín District Police Department that is included in this legal file, and the statements of the doctors and nurses who aided him at the San Martín polyclinic on the morning of June
10
—but also the testimony of the other survivors.

Most importantly, what remains
DEFINITELY PROVEN
based on Fernández Suárez's own confession is:

1
. That on June
9
,
1956
, he arrested a group of men in person, one of whom was Livraga.

2
. That the arrest of these men occurred at
11
:
00
p.m. on June
9
, namely an hour and a half before martial law was instated.

3
. That these men had not participated in the rebellion.

4
. That these men did not put up any kind of resistance to the arrest.

5
. That these men were executed at dawn, “by order of the Executive Power,” according to Fernández Suárez.

 

34.
The Livraga File

The events that I recount in this book were systematically denied or distorted by the government of the Liberating Revolution.

The first official version of the story appears in the form of a telegram addressed to Livraga's father on June
12
,
1956
, from the head of the Presidential Military House, Captain Manrique. It states that Juan Carlos was “wounded during a shooting.”

We have already seen what that shooting was like.

Fernández Suárez falsely claimed that Livraga had not even been wounded, let alone executed.

In the indictment that was fabricated against Doglia, Esq., the Governance Ministry of the Province claimed that Livraga fled “moments before his execution” and added with true candor that “it was unclear whether shots of any kind had been fired at him.”

The same indictment then admits that Livraga “exhibited injuries,” but considers them to be “evidence of his active participation in the revolutionary movement.”

It was a charming way of flipping the evidence on its head: Livraga's injuries proved not that he had been executed, but that he was a revolutionary . . .

There were other sophisms, denials, and communiqués. I tore them apart one by one in my articles. Examining them at this point is unnecessary.

The evidence I collected over the course of many months of investigation allowed me to accuse Fernández Suárez of murder, which I did to the point of monotony without his ever deigning to sue me.

Still, there was something missing from this evidence: the document based on Livraga's formal accusation that was prepared by Judge Belisario Hueyo in La Plata.

I knew the basic contents of this document, but I only held a photocopy of it in my hands when the first edition of this book had already been published (
1957
).

I was then able to compare the two investigations, the judge's and mine. The two are practically identical and round each other out. In some ways, mine was more detailed: it included signed statements from the survivors. Judge Hueyo could not take statements from Troxler, Benavídez, and Gavino because they were in Bolivia. I had records of interviews with Horacio di Chiano, Torres, “Marcelo,” and dozens of minor witnesses who did not go through an official intake of any kind. And I had a photostatic copy of the State Radio registry book of announcers, which established the time at which martial law was instated.

In other ways, the Livraga file goes beyond what I could have imagined. In addition to being the official account of the case, it contains confessions from the executioners themselves.

It is therefore this file that, as of the second edition of this book (
1964
), I call upon as evidence.

My personal experience with judges, as a journalist, has not been encouraging. I could name a dozen whom I know to be factious, inept, or simply corrupt. I choose instead to offer, as a model of determination, speed, and efficiency, the actions of Judge Hueyo throughout this case.

The way he carried out his investigation was truly exemplary. He does the justice system of this country an honor.

The Livraga file begins on December
14
,
1956
, with the report he gave to Judge Viglione who, for reasons of jurisdictional competence, remits it to Judge Hueyo five days later.

It is a detailed account of his arrest, transfer to the San Martín District Police Department, failed execution, brief stay at the San Martín polyclinic, imprisonment in Moreno, and recovery in Olmos. It includes a piece of physical evidence: a small square of paper dated June
10
,
1956
at the San Martín District Police Department, with signatures from three officers confirming that “a White Star watch, a key ring, ten pesos and a handkerchief” were confiscated from Livraga that night.

There are three mistakes in the report that would make the judge's investigation (and my own) more difficult. It says there were five men arrested in the back apartment of the house in Florida when there were at least eight. It says there were ten of them taken out in the assault car to be executed when there were at least twelve. It claims there were two survivors (he and Giunta) when in reality there were seven. Of all of them, he only knew Vicente Rodríguez, who was dead. And as for the executioners, he only knows that they were policemen from the Province.

The places and events, on the other hand, are described with photographic precision.

On December
24
, Judge Hueyo issues the first orders: to ask the head of the Presidential Military House, by way of an subpoena, to identify “which reports were used to draft the telegram” where it is stated that Livraga was injured during a shooting; to send an official letter to the Chief of Police requesting that he report whether Livraga was detained in mid-June at the San Martín District Police Department and at Moreno, then at Olmos, and to identify “the judge who was in charge of his case”; to solicit the same reports from the head of the San Martín District Police Department, the commissioner in Moreno, and the director of the penitentiary in Olmos; and finally, to ask the San Martín polyclinic if Livraga received treatment there (page
26
).

The head of the Presidential Military House, Captain Manrique, was a busy man: he never responded. Fernández Suárez will only respond one month later, when the complicity of the central government has already been ascertained.

The San Martín District Police Department, on the other hand, replies immediately: “On the requested date I report no record exists detention Juan Carlos Livraga.” The telegram (p.
27
) is signed by O. de Bellis, who has replaced Rodríguez Moreno as chief of the department.

The new commissioner of Moreno, in turn, responds with a cryptic dispatch: “Regarding report
3702
made by Juan Carlos Livraga I inform you Your Honor these premises no record books exist marking detention of aforementioned.” Signed F. Ferrairone.

The judge's reply:

As the police commissioner of Moreno has failed to report on whether prisoner Juan Carlos Livraga stayed or did not stay in that precinct, I am issuing a new letter to ask as a matter of urgency that you report specifically on whether the aforementioned Juan Carlos Livraga was detained on the premises in the middle of last June, if affirmative, then dates of intake and release and the name of the judge who was in charge of his case.

The Moreno precinct insists on its ignorance: “Regarding detention Juan Carlos Livraga I inform Your Honor these premises no record books exist his detention. Ferrairone.”

Was the allegedly executed man's story then false? Doubt begins to dissipate on page
29
when Doctor Marcelo Méndez Casariego, from the San Martín polyclinic, responds with a note:

In reference to your telegram dated the
24
th of this month requesting records of Mr. Juan Carlos Livraga, this administration communicates to Your Honor that the aforementioned man was brought to the emergency room on June
10
of this year, at
7
:
45
a.m., under the custody of the San Martín District Police Department of the Province of Buenos Aires, who took him away at
9
:
00
p.m. on the same day.

But De Bellis and Ferrairone weren't lying either. The arrest of Livraga and the others did not appear in the San Martín and Moreno books for the simple reason that the formality of recording their intake was not carried out. Without a record, an arrest becomes a simple abduction. So the entire operation bore the indelible stamp of secrecy.

On behalf of Aramburu and in response to one of the desperate letters that Livraga's father sent when he didn't know the whereabouts of his son, the general secretary of the presidency, Colonel Víctor Arribau, had informed him by telegram on June
29
,
1956
that: “The investigation is being taken up with urgency.” Now Judge Hueyo, on page
32
, orders that a subpoena be issued to Colonel Arribau to report on “the result of the investigation that he refers to in the telegram that appears on page
8
and, if possible, to remit a summary so that the Court may see it.”

The reply, of course, never came. But in the meantime, the press campaign that I had just set in motion produced its first results. Livraga's accusation had landed in my hands on December
20
. I submitted it to Leónidas Barletta, who published it in
Propósitos
on the twenty-third. The governing authority of the Province, newly appointed by the Liberating Revolution, and the Chief of Police considered themselves obligated to issue an explosive press release that was published in the papers on the twenty-seventh and the twenty-eighth. Judge Hueyo would not let the opportunity pass him by. On page
33
he stipulates: “In response to the declaration made by the Chief of Police, as it appears in the December
28
edition of the newspaper
El Plata
, wherein he claims that the man himself (Juan Carlos Livraga) was arrested in San Martín for his participation in the subversive acts of June
9
and that it was proven that he was part of the group of people who were receiving orders from ex-General Tanco, and who were subjected to martial law regulations; the Chief of Police is requested to make known which judge oversaw the investigation in question.”

Fernández Suárez did not reply. There had been no other judge than him.

On page
35
, for the first time, the police of the Province respond to a request made by the court. The Documents Division releases Livraga's file, which states that he was arrested on June
9
,
1956
,
one day before martial law was instated
.

Meanwhile, Colonel Aniceto Casco, the general manager of penal institutions, provides new confirmation of Livraga's story by reporting that “he entered Unit
1
(the penitentiary in Olmos) on July
3
,
1956
.”

On January
8
,
1957
, Commissioner Ovidio R. de Bellis appears before the court. As successor to Rodríguez Moreno for the San Martín District Police Department, he states that he knows nothing about what happened because he was not there on that date, and reasserts that Livraga's arrest is not listed in the Department's books.

The judge shows him the receipt. De Bellis claims that the form “is not the one usually used as a receipt for prisoners' personal items” and that “he cannot explain who the undersigned autographs belong to.” When questioned about the executions, he replies: “the person who was chief of the District Police Department at the time, Mister Rodríguez Moreno, will be in a better position to report to the court on the matter.”

Upon leaving the judge's office, de Bellis comes across someone who is in the best possible position to confirm or deny Livraga's formal accusation. It is Miguel Ángel Giunta, the second survivor, who finally decides to talk.

Giunta's story is even more precise than Livraga's. He explains both the circumstances that led him to Horacio di Chiano's apartment, as well as the raid, which he says took place at
11
:
15
p.m. or
11
:
30
p.m. on June
9
. Without naming him, he describes Fernández Suárez: “a large man, that is to say strong, with a mustache and a good amount of hair, who was wearing sand-colored pants and a short, olive green, military jacket; this person was carrying a .
45
caliber pistol in his hand and, having told everyone to put their hands up, placed the barrel of the gun on the declarant's throat, saying to him again: ‘Put your hands up, don't be smart with me.'” First there are blows to his stomach and to his hip, then there's the transfer to the Department, where the officer who interrogates him is “under thirty years old, chubby, curly-haired, with a handlebar mustache.” The one overseeing the interrogations is the second-in-command, last name Cuello, “a person of short stature who walks with a stoop and with his hands behind his back.” Giunta also identifies Rodríguez Moreno, and among the prisoners he naturally remembers Mr. Horacio, Vicente Rodríguez, Livraga, and “a person with the last name Brión or Drión.” He recounts the story of the trip all the way to the garbage dump, getting off the truck in the night, the preparations for execution:

. . . they walked like that for twenty or thirty meters and then the guards stayed back and ordered them to keep on in the same direction . . . that was when everyone knew for sure that they would be killed . . . once the truck's headlights were shining on them . . . they realized what was happening and everyone panicked, some getting on their knees and begging for mercy not to be killed . . .

He gives an account of his getaway amidst the bullets, of the way he saved himself, and of how they arrested him again. Then he describes in detail the places he had been: the precinct in Munro, the District Police Department and San Martín's First Precinct, the cell where they locked him up, even the dog that they were training in the prison block.

On page
42
, Navy Lieutenant Jorge R. Dillon who, until very recently had run the policemen's health and welfare program, shows up voluntarily to make a statement. Here is his account:

That at daybreak on June
1
0
, at approximately
0045
hours, the declarant was in his home, which is located opposite the police department; that upon hearing the shooting which sparked the assault on said department, the declarant, armed, entered the Department and, from there, aided in its defense . . .; that thus he was present during the assault he has made reference to and participated in its suppression; that when the movement had already been stifled with respect to the attack on Headquarters, some time after four o'clock in the morning, the Chief of Police arrived together with the Vucetich Academy cadets and other personnel; that those who had been defending the building came down the stairs where they were met with those who had recently arrived; that they shared impressions and accounts of the events that had transpired . . . and that in that instance the declarant heard Chief of Police Lieutenant Colonel Desiderio Fernández Suárez say, addressing either Mr. Gesteira or another officer, the declarant does not recall which, the following words verbatim: “Send the order to the San Martín District Police Department to execute the group of individuals that I arrested immediately”; the order was sent via radio.