Reinalda Pereira, 29-years-old and five months pregnant, was abducted in Macul, in the capital, on December 15th, 1976 by members of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), the secret police of Pinochet’s regime.

Pereira was transferred to the Simón Bolívar clandestine detention center, where, despite her advanced state of pregnancy, she was beaten and tortured, including with electricity, and then forcibly disappeared.

For this crime, the Second Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court, in a final ruling, ratified the prison sentences against 31 former DINA agents.

“This is a case that should call upon those who deny the crimes of the dictatorship and vindicate it, so that they can see the terror that the victims had to live through,” said the plaintiff’s lawyer, Nelson Caucoto, who considered that this is a ruling of enormous importance due to the number of people sentenced to prison terms, in a successful trial thanks to the enormous work of the judge Miguel Vásquez Plaza.

The lawyer explained that this is a modern ruling, based on international law, which rejects amnesty, prescription and half-prescription. Furthermore, despite the fact that Pereira’s husband did not live to see the result of the trial to which he dedicated himself with such enthusiasm, “it will bring some peace and comfort to Reinalda’s family.”

The young woman joined the list of more than a thousand detainees whose whereabouts are still unknown.

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