Rodríguez Moreno was an exhausted and bewildered man when, at six o’clock in the morning on June 10, he informed La Plata Police Headquarters by radio that the order for execution had been carried out. Would he mention that more than half the prisoners had escaped? He opted to keep quiet.
At Headquarters, no one was sleeping. They asked for a list of the executed men. And now Rodríguez Moreno really had no choice but to send the list of the five dead.
—And the others? —bellowed Fernández Suárez.
—They escaped.
We will never know exactly what happened in the Chief of Police’s office when the distressed Chief Inspector came in to deliver his report. In a statement before the judge seven months later, Rodríguez Moreno will say that he “was treated severely” by Fernández Suárez.
The Chief of Police’s problem is easy to explain, but difficult to solve. He has arrested a dozen men before martial law was instated. He has executed them without trial. And now it turns out that seven of these men are alive.
Judging by what he does next, it is clear that he understands his situation. The first thing he does is scatter the killers and the witnesses. He sends Rodríguez Moreno and Cuello to the Mar del Plata District Police Department, and later he will send Commissioner De Paula (who saw Livraga in Moreno) to the precinct in Bernal.
On June 12, the papers publish a list—provided by the national government—of five “men executed in the region of San Martín,” with the mistakes that I already noted. The report does not say who arrested them, who ordered for them to be killed and why; it does not so much as allude to the escape of the other seven. An interesting precaution.
But Fernández Suárez feels compelled to talk. There are some who ask why he was not at Headquarters when the attack began, why he left the building undefended, why he only came back when the situation was resolved. Some will suggest that the Chief of Police was hedging his bets that night and that the executions he later ordered were his alibi. He brings in the press and, according to the June 11 and 12 La Plata newspapers, explains to them:
“It was only by fortunate coincidence that I happened to be outside the Department during the uprising. During the emergency, I had traveled to the town of Moreno, where the accidental explosion of a bomb led us to discover a house belonging to the engineer Sarrabayrouse, who was affiliated with the Peronist party. We confiscated thirty-one high-powered time bombs from his arsenal. I was in the middle of this operation on Saturday when I was informed that a secret meeting that included General Tanco had taken place in a house in Vicente López.
“The operation led to the arrest of fourteen individuals, but the aforementioned member of the military was not apprehended. At 11:00 p.m., when I was in that house, I found out about the revolt at the Mechanics School and in Santa Rosa.”
Not a word about the final destination of these individuals. Who would connect the dots between a group of “men executed in the region of San Martín” and an apartment in Vicente López?
And yet, Fernández Suárez has already given himself away. Because the crucial thing that he says here before anyone has even accused him of anything is that he arrested these individuals at 11:00 p.m. An hour and a half before martial law was instated.
It looks like Fernández Suárez will be able to sleep soundly. For nearly four months, no one asks him for any explanations.
But when the bomb explodes, it’s not two thousand kilometers away, it’s not across a border that has already been opened and closed for three survivors.
It’s in the Chief of Police’s very office.
At the start of October 1956, Naval Information Services inform him, confidentially, that one of his own men has denounced him.
Fernández Suárez does not need to walk ten paces to find the culprit. It is Jorge Doglia, Esq., head of the Police Judicial Division.
—The only case during my tenure —F. S. will later say, deeply dejected— of a man from the street becoming a chief inspector.
This is true. For the police, Doglia is a “man from the street,” just like Fernández Suárez, who appointed him. A man genuinely committed to civil rights and liberties (thirty-one years of age, a Radical Intransigente at the time), Doglia the lawyer has taken that fleeting slogan from ’55 seriously: “The Rule of Law.” But right after he assumes his post, he learns that the prisoners giving him their statements complain of torture and bear traces of their punishment. He brings the problem to Fernández Suárez, who first pretends to be shocked and later mocks him openly.
The he goes to the second-in-command, Captain Ambroggio, and shows him photos of the prisoners who, by the look of it, have been whipped with wires. The second-in-command looks at the photos with a critical eye.
—That’s not wire —he explains.— That’s rubber.
Now Doglia knows what to expect. The problem is systemic, so the only thing he can do is document it. In August or September he meets Livraga. Then he goes to Naval Information Services and all his cards are revealed.
There is a heated exchange between Doglia and the Chief of Police. Fernández Suárez openly threatens him. On the tenth of October, Doglia presents his indictment again, this time before the Governance Ministry of the Province.
Doglia’s indictment has two parts to it: the first refers to the system of torture; the second, to the illegal execution of Livraga. On this point, Doglia cannot know more than what Livraga himself tells him, which is that they wanted to execute him and a bunch of other people, the majority of whom he did not know by name, and that he and Giunta escaped.
Fernández Suárez strikes back by accusing Doglia of “having gone to an organization outside the department to report acts committed in the heart of the police department.” He fabricates a shameful allegation with the support of the Governance Ministry and the Attorney General, Dr. Alconada Aramburú. On January 18, 1957, Doglia’s name will appear in the papers, flanked on one side by the name of a policeman who was a drunk, and on the other by the name of a policeman who had committed acts of torture. All three of them were removed from their offices “for ethical reasons.”
But Doglia spoke to Eduardo Schaposnik, the socialist representative for the Advisory Board, and at the beginning of December, in a secret session, the charges are made again, this time from Schaposnik’s lips.
On December 14, it is Livraga himself who appears in court to sue “whoever was responsible” for attempted homicide and damages.
Fernández Suárez starts seeing ghosts. On December 18, in a fit of courage, he appears in front of the Advisory Board to rebut Schaposnik.