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Justice For Pinochet Takes the Weekend Off
A Chilean judge ordered the arrest of General Augusto Pinochet today, charging the former dictator with 36 kidnappings, 23 counts of torture, and a murder. As part of an ongoing investigation, Judge Alejandro Solis met with Pinochet at his home earlier this month. The 90-year-old reportedly denied involvement in the torture and disappearance of political prisoners during his 17-year dictatorship. But Solis came away doubting Pinochet's claim that he suffers from dementia, saying he did not observe any symptoms of mental illness during his visit.
Judge Solis' announcement is the most recent development in what has seemed like an endless series of court proceedings aimed at prosecuting Pinochet for human rights abuses. But the saga isn't quite over yet. The arrest isn't expected to take place until Monday.
In the meantime, check out some of Mother Jones recent stories about the quest to bring Pinochet to justice, including this recent profile of torture survivor and crusader Hector Salgado and this 2004 profile of Baltasar Garzón, the Spanish judge who tried to extradite Pinochet in 1998.
—Celia Perry
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Now here's a good parallel: Pinochet and Bush; which begs the question: are we going to have to wait until Bush turns ninety before he's brought to justice...?
Or is this exactly the big difference between Chile today and modern America--there is no judge in the US with the integrity to stand up to Boy George W.
In fact, Misprision of Felony (18 USC Section 4) prescribes how judges themselves are duty bound to act upon knowledge of felony, while The Organized Crime Control Act of 1970 allows such a judge to take his or her case directly to a grand jury.
So..., is not this pertinent where Title 18 USC Part 1, Chapter 118, Section 2441 (c), War Crimes reads: "'War Crime' means any conduct ... of a person who willfully kills or causes serious injury to civilians." Now, of course, it is common knowledge that the US has unnecessarily "thrown" many, many depleted uranium artillery shells into civilian areas in Iraq, which have unnecessarily caused a variety of dreadful diseases, especially among CHILDREN!!!!!!
Most surely this unconscionable behavior deserves harsh punishment--yet it doesn't seem too damn likely that any judge in the US is going to step forward...