The testament of Lucía Hiriart, widow of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), was opened this Wednesday after a lawsuit filed by the State Defense Council (CDE) against Pinochet’s testamentary heirs for “profit of the fraud of others.”
The procedure, which took place privately, “is part of a set of actions carried out by the CDE with the purpose of recover embezzled resources by him and his collaborators,” the agency said in a statement.
The entity filed a lawsuit with the purpose that the Pinochet’s heirs are sentenced to pay the Treasury around 16 million dollars, corresponding to the money that the dictator obtained illegally.
“Although it was not proven that [sus herederos] who had participated in the illegal acts, would be recipients of an economic benefit that was the result of conduct fully proven criminal“, the CDE maintained in its note.
A KEY RESOURCE TO RECOVER THE MONEY
In 2018, the Supreme Court put an end to the Riggs case after accepting an appeal filed by the CDE in which the courts convicted three collaborators of the general as perpetrators of the crime of embezzlement of public funds and which made it possible to undertake a series of legal actions to recover the defrauded money.
“The judgment decreed the confiscation of assets that were in the name of the ex-general or one of its companies, the majority offshore and with bearer shares”, indicates the CDE.
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However, according to the entity, despite considering the total amount of damage, which amounts to almost 18 million dollars, the Supreme Court considered that the accessory penalty of confiscation could only fall on that part of the assets that was related to the intervention of the condemned.
The court also noted that “there was more than enough probative evidence” that Pinochet “involved in conduct that amounted to the theft of public funds” and, given this scenario, “it was reasonably possible to infer” that the assets could be considered as “the effects or product of the perpetration of his criminal conduct committed to the detriment of the national treasury ”, notes the CDE.
Hiriart was a key figure in Pinochet’s life and exerted the greatest influence on him to join the coup uprising that in September 1973 overthrew the government of Salvador Allende (1970-1973).
With the return of democracy, Hiriart continued to be at the center of scandals linked to how his family amassed a fortune during the years in which he held absolute power.