perpetration of violent acts was presumed, without further justification. In addition, the judgment
considered as an element to establish the participation of the presumed victims in the offenses of
terrorist threat, their membership in the Coordinadora de Comunidades en Conflicto Arauco
Malleco (CAM) which the court referred to as “having violent tendencies.” No objective evidence
or proof was offered to confirm this organization’s character or nature.55 In this regard, it should
be recalled that, in another proceeding, the presumed victims were acquitted of the offense of
“conspiracy to commit a crime” in relation to their supposed membership “in a terrorist
organization that operated under the aegis of this indigenous organization.”56
B)
The criminal judgment convicting Messrs. Marileo Saravia, Huenchunao
Mariñán and Millacheo Licán, and Ms. Troncoso Robles
39.
In the criminal judgment that convicted Juan Patricio Marileo Saravia, Florencio
Jaime Marileo Saravia, José Benicio Huenchunao Mariñán, Juan Ciriaco Millacheo Licán
and Patricia Roxana Troncoso Robles as perpetrators of the offense of terrorist arson,
the criminal court, when analyzing both the participation and the terrorist nature of
the offense, followed a line of reasoning in which, once again, it circumscribed
conclusions regarding the special subjective element of the criminal responsibility of
the presumed victims to contextual facts regarding which it makes no direct probative
or legal connection to the accused.57 Regarding the terrorist intent, in the nineteenth
55
See the fifteenth considerandum of the judgment issued by the Angol Oral Criminal Trial Court on
September 27, 2003, in which the domestic Court made an analysis: “[r]egarding the participation of the
two accused” as authors of offenses “of terrorist threats”:
[…] Regarding the participation of both accused, the following must be considered:
1. As general background information and from the evidence provided during the trial by the Public
Prosecution Service and the private complainants, it is a well-known and notorious fact that de
facto organizations have been operating have existed in the area for some time that commit acts of
violence or incite violence on the pretext of their land claims. Their methods include different types
of acts of violence against logging companies, and small- and medium-scale farmers, all of whom
have in common that they are owners of land that adjoins, is next to or near indigenous
communities who claim to have historical rights to these properties. The said actions are aimed at
reclaiming lands considered to be ancestral, and the illegal occupation is a means used to achieve
the more ambitious goal: thereby recovering part of their ancestral lands and strengthening the
territorial identity of the Mapuche people. […]
2. It has not been sufficiently proved that these acts were caused by individuals who do not belong
to the Mapuche communities, because their purpose is to create a strong climate of harassment of
the property owners in the sector in order to instill fear in them and, thus, force the owners to
accede to their demands. The rationale relates to the so-called “Mapuche problem,” because the
perpetrators were aware of the areas claimed or because no Mapuche community or property has
been harmed.
3. It has been proved that the accused, Pascual Pichú, is Lonko of the “Antonio Ñirripil” community
and Segundo Norín is Lonko of the “Lorenzo Norín” community, and this signifies status in the
community and a certain degree of leadership and control over it.
4. It should also be emphasized that the accused Pichún and Norín have been convicted of other
offenses involving land occupation committed prior to these events against forested properties near
their respective communities, […].
5. The Mapuche communities of Didaico and Temulemu adjoin the Nancahue forest farm, and
6. According to the testimony of Osvaldo Carvajal, both of the accused belong to the Coordinadora
Arauco Malleco C.A.M, a violent de facto organization.
56
Cf. para. 215 of the Judgment.
57
In the sixteenth considerandum of the judgment delivered on August 22, 2004, by the Angol Oral
Criminal Trial Court, when referring to the “participation as direct authors of the fire at the Poluco Pidenco
property,” the Court affirmed:
14