Ex-Argentine cops convicted for “Dirty War” massacre

A pair of former senior policemen in Argentina was sentenced to life in prison for their role in a “Dirty War” massacre. Ex-police captains Juan Carlos Lapuyole and Carlos Gallone were found guilty of kidnapping and murder for the 1976 Fatima massacre; an atrocity described by one attorney as "the worst massacre in [Argentine] history":

Before dawn on August 20, 1976, thirty illegally detained and drugged prisoners from the Intendencia were forced into a truck and driven away from Buenos Aires up Route 8 beyond the outskirts of the city. About forty miles from the city, the prisoners were unloaded from the truck, blindfolded with their hands tied, and summarily executed. Each received a shot in the head from about three feet away. To dispose of the bodies, guards piled the dead prisoners over a charge of dynamite near the town of Fatima and blew them up. Body parts were found as far as 60 feet from the explosion.

It has been over two decades since the end of the argentine “Dirty War” yet it has been in recent years that there has been a greater legal and political push to punish those who committed barbaric crimes. Telenovelas have recently discussed illegally adopted babies during the “Dirty War” while a soccer match last month celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of Argentina’s World Cup victory also commemorated those who died and “disappeared” during the military regime.

Image- New York Times (“A member of Mothers of May Plaza, a group that has pushed for answers about the dirty war. They wore scarves with names of the disappeared at the trial of the Rev. Christian von Wernich.”)

Sources- truthout.org, The Latin Americanist, Reuters, Radio Netherlands Worldwide, BBC News