Juan Guzmán Tapia: A Coherent Man 26.01.2021 - Santiago de Chile - Tomás Hirsch
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Over the years, the impossible becomes reality: Juan Guzmán does justice. At the cost of cutting his judicial career short, at the cost of losing promotions and opportunities typical of that office, but with the advantage of receiving, as few do in Chile, the affection of the people and the recognition of his peers in the world.
This week the great judge has left our time and space: Juan Guzmán Tapia. I immediately remembered the tribute we paid to him at the Laura Rodríguez Foundation 15 years ago, in 2005, when we presented him with the Coherence Award. I want to share part of my words spoken that day at the former National Congress, in a simple ceremony, but full of deep meaning:
Juan Guzmán Tapia, judge who battled Chilean dictator, dies at 81 Matt Schudel Juan Guzmán Tapia, a Chilean judge who was the first person to prosecute the country’s onetime military ruler, Augusto Pinochet, using novel legal strategies to hold him and members of his regime accountable for killings and human rights offenses in the 1970s and 1980s, died Jan. 22 at age 81. Chilean newspapers, including La Tercera, reported his death, which was confirmed by his family to Spanish-language news services. Other details were not disclosed, but Judge Guzmán lived in Santiago and had dementia, said a friend, Peter Kornbluh, the author of “The Pinochet File.”