Argentina's Missing Bones. James P. Brennan
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Название: Argentina's Missing Bones
Автор: James P. Brennan
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Историческая литература
Серия: Violence in Latin American History
isbn: 9780520970076
isbn:
FIGURE 6. The cuadra, where prisoners were held in the La Perla death camp.
FIGURE 7. La Perla shower stalls for prisoners.
FIGURE 8. La Perla former torture chamber.
As with other camps, La Perla had its collection of particularly brutal torturers, usually known by the nom de guerre and nicknames they had adopted to hide their true identity, such as a sergeant, it was later learned, with the name of Elpidio Rosario Tejeda, known in the camp as “Texas.” The Contepomis’ memoir of life in the camp relates the horrors of Texas’s torture session, blows with a paddle applied with methodical efficiency to the body’s extremities and most sensitive parts. Found there was another torturer known as the “Priest” with a predilection for torturing radical clergymen from the Third World Priests movement, and yet another, “Uncle,” a balding, middle-aged torturer obsessed with the excrement and stench of the torture room that he attempted to camouflage with flowers and aromatic herbs, as well as prints to cover the blood-stained walls.10 There was camp commandant Menéndez himself, who went by the moniker of “Mutt” for his hound-dog face, given to outbursts of rage and also the organizer of strange, solemn ceremonies before the removal and execution of the prisoners, executions in which Menéndez on a number of occasions personally took part. False surnames were also used: Major Ernesto Barreiro, a member of the Destacamento 141 de Inteligencia del Tercer Cuerpo assigned to the camp and a figure of great authority there in its early months, had several nicknames (Nabo, Rubio, Gringo) and also went by the false surname of Hernández.11 Anonymity was an obsession among the torturers.
FIGURE 9. La Perla sentry tower.
The Contepomis’ memoir relates other details about the camp: rivalries between the military police and regular army personnel in which the prisoners found themselves in the middle, suffering the consequences; the state of being permanently blindfolded and prohibited from standing erect save at mealtimes; the continuous psychological terror and mental anguish of being the next in line for the “truck,” a death ride to one’s execution; the unexpected occasional acts of kindness by their captors, followed by equally unexpected acts of cruelty, adding to the sense of vulnerability and unreality in La Perla.12 There were also moments of solidarity, compassion, and even heroism: a shared cigarette, the furtive embrace of comrade or friend, the female prisoner who insisted in accompanying her son and daughter-in-law to a final execution, thereby ensuring her own. Mostly there was just boredom, punctuated by moments of terror and torment. The mass executions generally coincided with the cuadra reaching its maximum number of prisoners, thereby providing the prisoners some degree of predictability of the moment of the final, in the death camp jargon, traslado (transfer). The military’s macabre jargon offered two kinds of transfer: traslado por izquierda (transfer to the left), for the vast majority, meant execution; the traslado por derecha (transfer to the right), for a lucky few, meant transfer to a federal penitentiary or perhaps another detention center, and very exceptionally outright release, though subject to constant vigilance and even house arrest.13
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