Daily Recommendation: LAS CRUCES

Just days after the Military Coup of 1973, 19 workers were arrested and carried to the Laja Police Station. After being detained 5 days, they disappeared. The Police told to their relatives that they were transferred to a military regiment in the city of Los Angeles, but they didn’t find them there. They looked for 6 years until their remains appeared in the Yumbel cemetery. There was no explanation about how they got there.

Almost 40 years after the massacre, one of the police officers involved, broke the silence pact they had made the night of the massacre and the case was reopened. This way is known that the 19 workers were killed in a forest near the town of Laja, and the Paper and Cardboard Manufacturing Company (CMPC) had relation with those deaths. The workers were captured, imprisoned, tortured and the night they were killed in the back. Despite the confessions and the investigation ́s findings, all the officers involved that night are free. Today, the case is still open waiting to know who will be convicted.

LAS CRUCES
A film by Teresa Arredondo and Carlos Vásquez Méndez
(Chile, 2018, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

Now streaming on DAFilms Americas

Watch the trailer:

Directed by Teresa Arredondo & Carlos Vásquez Méndez · 16mm · color · 80′ · 2018 · Sinopsis [ENG] “In September 1973, days after the coup d’état, 19 workers of a paper company disappeared after being arrested for their participation in the labor union or in left parties. 40 years later a policeman broke the pact of silence, revealing the participation of the private company CMPC in the death of these 19 men. Today the case remains open”. [SPA] “En Septiembre de 1973, días después del golpe de Estado, 19 trabajadores de una empresa de papel desaparecieron después de haber sido arrestados por su participación en el sindicato o en partidos de izquierda. 40 años después un policía rompió el pacto de silencio, revelando la participación de la Compañía privada CMPC en la muerte de estos 19 hombres. Hoy el caso se mantiene abierto”.