This is an exclusive English-language translation of the article ‘10 años de condena a Diego Torales por torturar a Luciano Arruga‘ by the Red Nacional de Medios Alternativos.
Those of us who walk the path of alternative, community, and popular media with great conviction, try not to avoid superlatives. Today, we ask for permission to ignore that rule. The verdict that sentenced police inspector Julio Diego Torales to ten years in prison for torturing Luciano Nahuel Arruga is historic, unexpected, unbelievable. How can a family that saw the state torture (and the state itself has admitted to this), kidnap, and disappear (though it still does not admit to that) a 16-year-old boy believe in justice? They can’t. But they bet on it. With the clear message of another Nunca Más (‘never again’), this time for real, they made a strong bet. And they won — just the first round, but it was a massive surprise.
The courthouse was full with people waiting to hear the verdict (photo: Facundo Nívolo/RNMA)
The morning began too early, fused with the night that preceded it. No one who was looking forward to this special day was able to sleep. For logistical reasons, we first had to go past the former police station where the events unfolded on that fateful 22nd September 2008. Logistics and a bit of a taste of victory as well. Because that place, very slowly, like everything the ‘Family and Friends of Luciano Arruga’ do, is turning into a memorial space named after him.
We had to pick up some banners, cables for the open radio, and paint to cover the walls that border the San Justo courts with the emblematic face of that kid, who is so many other kids. Let us imagine as well that we went and picked up Luciano to take him to the trial; allow us, just for today, such an absurdity. We know Luciano is not here. We notice, not in his absence, because we never met him, but in the faces of [his sister] Vanesa, of [his mother] Mónica, of his grandmother, of those who lost him inexplicably and who feel it every morning when they get up and every night in their dreams. It’s difficult to go there, to walk through that kitchen that served as a torture room. Hopefully, it will always be difficult to go there, even if it becomes a space for the kids in the neighbourhood to try and avoid the future that this perverse system imposes on them.
The former police station turned into a memorial (photo: Facundo Nívolo/RNMA)
This place, a typical middle-class house in a neighbourhood like Lomas del Mirador, was turned into an area of confinement to appease the souls of those who still believe they need to fear the kids who wear a cap, a sports jacket, and faded jeans, rather than the mafias that control them. Some day, maybe, they will understand that the subject of their fear should be someone else. Maybe they will think that what happened to Luciano could have happened to one of their kids. For now, that’s not how it is. The thought that “they must have done something” still prevails, and it’s followed by “it won’t happen to me”.
For [Luciano’s sister] Vanesa Orieta, the morning was hard, even more so than other times. You can see it on her face. It started very early, because her compañeros had arranged a live interview with a TV channel first thing in the morning. She went to the park where they’d arranged to meet and waited, but the reporter never showed up. When they called the producer, he told them the agenda had changed. Boca-River, the pepper spray incident… they forgot to let her know. That’s how it works when the news come before the people. That’s what makes us different as well. For us the news, the stories we tell, are firstly people who feel, who generally suffer, because those are the stories we choose to tell.
We’re finally before the court house, the humidity turns into heat and the heat turns into people. More and more people arrive, knowing they won’t be able to enter the building, that the space is as small as the ruling will be historical.
We need power for the open radio. Only the greengrocer’s in the corner can help us. Fermín goes round, explains the situation, asks them, and the sound appears. People keep coming. As well as the families of Luciano and Torales, there will only be room for 16 people. That doesn’t include us journalists, who generally do our utmost not to look like people. Sixteen people and journalists, we could put it like that. Some 600 people wait outside. They trust we can bring them the sounds of the justice being made inside.
After a long wait, we manage to get in. The room is small. The judges’ bench is on the back wall, there’s barely any room for the lawyers on the sides. A wooden fence separates us from them. We run to the first row, to give them a hug, like the young fans who pile up against the stage when their favourite band is playing. Clearly, the judiciary is not our favourite band, but today they will play a fantastic gig.
Vanesa Orieta, Luciano’s sister (photo: Facundo Nívolo/RNMA)
We have two aims: to project the audio outside the courthouse and to broadcast live so that those who couldn’t make it can listen to it through the radio. We achieved both. The room is overflowing with people and with sweat. We’re crowded together as if we were in a football match. On the other side, the lawyers of CELS [Centre for Legal and Social Studies] and APDH La Matanza [Permanent Assembly for Human Rights] with three members of Luciano’s family: mum Mónica, sister Vanesa, and grandmother Marta. Moni cries, she can’t take it anymore. Vanesa and Marta are rigid, almost completely still, with their backs upright against the wood that corners them. Vane’s sight is lost in a memory that only she knows. That’s how it will be throughout the reading of the ruling. A long wait.
Torales and the judges of the Oral Tribunal number three of La Matanza — Diana Volpicina, Gustavo Navarrine, and Liliana Logroño — are yet to arrive. On her way in, Navarrine walked through the crowd and waved to those of us who know her with a smile. It was a good sign of what was about to come. We managed to say it on the radio, maybe looking for some hope in the midst of so much anxiety.
But now they keep us waiting. They close the door behind us. We’re even more cramped than before. This is not a good sign. Didn’t they realise that there would be more people than in the previous hearings? Surely they knew. The small room makes us think that maybe they didn’t want a lot of people to listen to what they were going to say, but outside the sound spreads.
Torales walks in. They take off the handcuffs, as usual. He sits in the only empty spot, reserved for him to listen to the verdict. Behind him is his family. The judges walk in. The few people who weren’t already standing, stand up. The secretary begins to read. We can quickly guess the result. ‘No’ to the charges for false testimony against Vanesa and Juan Gabriel Apud, Luciano’s friend. ‘Yes’ to the torture charges. Now the state is saying it. It’s no longer an exaggeration by the family. ‘Yes’ to the physical torture and mental duress. The prison term is still to come, but the arguments are based on the plaintiff’s request. The court recognises that Luciano was barely a child. That he was tortured and that Torales is responsible for it. Ten years. Yes, ten years. End of the trial. Vanesa had requested that there be no applauses. Nothing to celebrate. Someone rips his throat calling the name of Luciano Arruga, present, now and forever. Ten years. Who would have thought?
Hugs wet with tears and we have to go down the stairs one floor on our way out. The first thing we see is the semicircle that becomes a full circle when Vanesa arrives. Every kid’s sister, again. She shouts, she denounces, she convinces. She warns that her brother is not the only one. That they were able to break the perverse enclosure that surrounds the huge number of sad stories of those who suffer without any microphones close by. Mónica also becomes strong and turns into that mother who takes a little bit of justice in her back pocket, back to her home in Villa 12 de Octubre. Outside, the warmth of the people.
Mónica talks on the open radio (photo: Facundo Nívolo/RNMA)
After the encounter with the big media, it’s time to share with their equals. The open radio expands. Mónica takes over the microphone, which according to the handwritten piece of paper stuck to it, belongs to ‘Studio 3’. It’s the only one amplifying her voice, and it’s more than enough. She names others who are no longer here. It’s not just her ‘Lu’. “For all of those who didn’t get justice, for Daniel Solano, for Kiki Lezcano, for Facundo Rivera Alegre, for Otoño Uriarte, for Gonzalo Rivera, for Atahualpa Martínez Vinaya, and if I forget anyone it’s because there’s so, so many of them… but know that I think about each one of you, because all of you are Luciano. Justice for all our kids and let’s not forget about Jorge Julio López.”
Vane shows up. She breaks the silence with the anguish of her voice: “The most important thing for the family is that we have shown that what we were saying was true. When we began denouncing the case, Luciano was the ‘leader of a mafia’, he was ‘into drugs’, he was the ‘worst of the worst’. We were on our own, trying to make the case visible. We started on our own, but it was everyone’s effort that made the case visible, so that they couldn’t talk about a 16-year-old kid as if he were responsible for his own disappearance. We were able to defeat the media’s disinformation.”
She also remembered those other kids, “who have the same face Lu had, the same clothes, the same way of talking, of walking, the same persecution and discrimination.” And there’s more: “When my brother disappeared, I promised I wouldn’t stop, first until I made the case visible, then clean up his image, and then throw the scum that made him suffer in jail. Let this be an example that it’s good to be here, listening to the judges and criticising their rulings when they’re not fair.”
She left the microphone, only to take it back a few seconds later. “I want to thank all the family members who were with us in this moment, your presence is very important to us. A big hug also to the alternative, community, independent media as I call them, who have been here from the beginning, helping us make this struggle visible; and an endless hug to the lawyers Juan Manuel Combi, Maximiliano Medina, and María Dinard.” Next up is Pablo Pimentel, leader of APDH La Matanza, who says that “from the first day that Vanesa approached the APDH, 45 days after Luciano’s disappearance, still desperate, we never saw an act of revenge.”
The president of the tribunal, Judge Volpicina, comes out. She walks among the crowd, which is no small thing. It has been an intense day. A lot more moving than expected. Here we are again, writing an article. This time, it’s about the end of a historic trial, of a dimension that, probably, we are still unable to grasp. The tears, again, fall on the keyboard. But the fingers carry on. It has been an unforgettable day.
Translated by Celina Andreassi.
The post Historic Verdict in Luciano Arruga Case appeared first on The Argentina Independent.