On the Civil Registry website, anyone can request birth, marriage and death certificates of a Chilean citizen. These requests for freely available certificates were the thread that the Prosecutor's Office pulled to find out if the Army has been monitoring journalists who investigate the dark areas of military activity.
In the criminal investigation of “Operation W” – the Army spying on journalist Mauricio Weibel, who revealed the millionaire embezzlement known as “Milicogate” – the Public Ministry has already proven that at least two officials from the Intelligence Directorate of the Army (DINE) requested the Civil Registry for background information related to the reporter and ex-military complainants of corruption within the military institution. Those two DINE officials are Luis Toledo Cid and Aida Segovia Crisóstomo.
A confidential report from the PDI, to which CIPER had access, indicates that Luis Toledo requested certificates from Mauricio Weibel and Carlos Farías (one of the former soldiers who denounced corruption in the Army). The document also indicates that Aida Segovia requested background information on the mother of Captain (r) Rafael Harvey, another whistleblower.
This report from the PDI, which was delivered to the Prosecutor's Office, indicates that the requests that Toledo and Segovia made to the Civil Registry come from the same IP address: 200.72.183.76. The civil police document reveals that from that same IP address, background information on journalists Javier Rebolledo, Juan Cristóbal Peña and Mauricio Weibel< was also requested from the Civil Registry. /b>.
From other IP addresses investigated by the police, background information was requested from former members of the Army who denounced corruption, and also from journalists Pascale Bonnefoy, Santiago Pavlovic–and from some of his direct relatives–, and of Danae Fuster. On the dates their data was requested from the Civil Registry, all of them were investigating cases related to military corruption or human rights violations committed during the dictatorship.
IP addresses are the “fingerprint” of Internet connections. Every time a computer or cell phone connects to the Internet, it “goes out” to the network with an IP address. And although in the case of connections that correspond to private addresses, that IP may vary over time, the institutions use fixed IPs, because they give the connection more stability.
All the IPs from which personal certificates of whistleblowers and journalists were requested are from the provider Entel. As someone who works in the network area of that company explained to CIPER, although for home connections the IP addresses can change every time someone from that house connects to the Internet, in the case of institutions, the IP addresses they are fixed (do not change) and usually use multiple IPs, because they connect a large number of computers to the network. It is the same thing that Jorge Pérez, an academic from the Department of Computer Science at the University of Chile, told CIPER.
For this reason, the finding that the PDI communicated to the Prosecutor's Office becomes important: the same IP from which two DINE officials asked the Civil Registry for the records of people who were under military espionage (Weibel, Farías and Harvey), is the one used to request data from other journalists.
Despite this evidence, sources of the judicial investigation told CIPER that they still have not been able to get the Army or Entel to confirm which institution uses each of the investigated IP addresses.
EXTENDING THE SEARCH RADIUS
It was at the end of 2019 that the Prosecutor's Office sent a list to the Civil Registry that included former Army officials who have denounced corruption and journalists who have investigated military embezzlement and violations of human rights. The Public Ministry requested that the Civil Registry inform it if background information on these people had been requested through its website and, if so, from which email addresses and IP addresses those requests had been issued.
On January 28, 2020, the PDI Official Crime Brigade had the report ready with the information provided by the Civil Registry. There are the emails and IP addresses that required certificates from journalists Pascale Bonnefoy (Chile correspondent for The New York Times and author of investigations into Human Rights violations); Juan Cristóbal Peña (author of books on the FPMR); Santiago Pavlovic (journalist for Informe Especial, from TVN); Danae Fuster (former journalist for Informe Especial) and Javier Rebolledo (author of books on military crimes during the dictatorship).
The conclusion of the PDI report is clear: certificates from all these journalists were requested from the Civil Registry platform and those who requested them used matching email addresses, in addition to common IP addresses. In some cases, anonymous emails also required certificates about their spouses or children from the Civil Registry.
The Central North High Complexity Prosecutor's Office maintains an investigation, up to now unformalized, into the Army's espionage of the journalist Mauricio Weibel, who currently collaborates with CIPER (see CIPER report "The document that shows how the Army deceived the Court of Appeals to spy on journalist Mauricio Weibel”). He is also investigating “Operation Topographer”, the spying on four former soldiers who denounced corruption in the Army. But now the investigation of the Prosecutor's Office has been expanded, after the prosecutor Jaime Retamal, in charge of the investigation, requested to extend the search radius, which gave rise to the PDI report.
CIPER asked the Army if, in addition to Mauricio Weibel, its Intelligence directorate had also monitored other journalists. We also asked if the IP addresses that appear in the PDI report were used by DINE. But the military institution avoided responding, relying on the Intelligence Law:
“In particular, and as previously indicated, the Army, in compliance with Law No. 19,974 and Article 182 of the Criminal Procedure Code, is not allowed to refer to matters that have a reserved nature and that are part of an investigation carried out by the Courts of Justice”, says the response sent to CIPER by the Department of Communications of the Army.
In the same communication, the Army indicated that the commander of its Intelligence Brigade told the commission of deputies that oversees the intelligence services that he is available to clarify doubts in that instance. But since this commission does not prepare minutes of its meetings, which are also secret, the opacity is total (see the Army's response here).
TRACTING THE FINGERPRINT
The PDI report established that from the IP address 200.111.136.4 certificates were requested from the journalists Mauricio Weibel and Pascale Bonnefoy between 2013 and 2016, but also about three of the former soldiers who denounced cases of corruption: Rafael Harvey, Sergio Tudesca and Carlos Farías. From that same IP, documents related to Cesar Fuentes Campusano and Raúl Fuentes Quintanilla, Army suppliers prosecuted in the case of embezzlement at that institution, were requested from the Civil Registry.
From an IP almost identical to the previous one (200.111.136.5) certificates were required for Mauricio Weibel and his ex-spouse, and again for Raúl Fuentes Quintanilla. Another IP address that is being targeted by the Prosecutor's Office is 200.111.134.82, from where certificates were requested from Weibel's ex-wife and the ex-partner of journalist Santiago Pavlovic and her son.
The investigation by the Prosecutor's Office has already verified that one of the IPs that appear in the PDI report has been used by DINE officials. It is about the address 200.72.183.76, from where certificates of the journalists Rebolledo, Peña and Weibel were requested; the corruption whistleblower Carlos Farías and the mother of Captain (r) Rafael Harvey.
One of the emails that were issued from that IP came from the personal email address of Luis Toledo Cid, who was revealed to be a member of the DINE when the detectives searched his name on Google: there was a document there where Toledo requested a legal holiday from the Army. The division for which he worked appeared in the same file. Toledo Cid finished confirming everything when he declared before the PDI on January 23, 2020.
“Since 2003, I have been working in the Army Intelligence Directorate, my workday is from 08:00 to 17:00”. This is how Toledo Cid began his statement before the police, to whom he informed that he was a licensed psychologist from the Andrés Bello University.
Luis Toledo appeared on the radar of the PDI because on June 16, 2017, he requested a marriage certificate from Mauricio Weibel. Five days later, on June 21, he did the same to obtain certificates from Carlos Farías, a former military officer who denounced corruption.
When the detectives questioned him about these requests, Toledo Cid recalled only part of what he claimed had happened:
“Because the internet terminal I use is only for public use, only sites or places that anyone can see are used, so, in the case of the electronic certificates of Mauricio Weibel Barahona and Carlos Farías Ramírez, I requested those certificates at the request of a DINE official, whom I do not remember. I did not redirect the digital certificates to another email box, since I always print them and give them to the person who requested it”.
Mauricio Weibel, journalist
The psychologist added in his statement that more than a hundred people work in the intelligence offices of the Army, including civilians and soldiers, and that not all computers are connected to the Internet, since those that contain sensitive material do not have access to network.
Regarding his duties at the DINE, he said that they only refer to matters related to his discipline: “Answer doubts or requirements that the command may have regarding matters related to my profession, such as taking a psychological exam for a person who wants to apply to a position, talk with DINE officials in order to carry out a psychological evaluation (...) I take surveys on the work environment, among other functions always linked to my position as a psychologist”.
In addition, Luis Toledo Cid appears with honorary contracts in the Public Criminal Defender's Office since 2008. In that distribution they pointed out to CIPER that he has provided services as a psychological and calligraphic expert in cases of the Southern Metropolitan Regional Defender's Office.
In his statement to the PDI, Luis Toledo provided key information to identify another person who is also requesting background information from the Civil Registry: "I understand that Aida Segovia Crisóstomo is a military man and works at the DINE, we do not have a friendship or I don't know what functions it performs either."
On December 13, 2016, Aida Segovia used her personal email to request a certificate from the mother of Captain (r) Rafael Harvey. She did it from the same IP address used by Luis Toledo Cid, and the same one from which certificates from journalists Javier Rebolledo, Juan Cristóbal Peña and Mauricio Weibel were requested.
CIPER sent emails to each of the addresses identified in the PDI report, explaining that we were preparing a report and that we needed to communicate with the users of those accounts. There was only one response: the person wrote a brief message, noting that "she used to buy and sell cars." In addition, he called the CIPER offices to verify that it was indeed a journalistic investigation, without providing his contact information. He did not answer again.
JOURNALISTS INVESTIGATING MILITARY MEMBERS
Journalist Juan Cristóbal Peña, author of books such as “The secret literary life of Augusto Pinochet”, “Los fusileros” and “Jóvenes pistoleros”, told CIPER that he was working in the investigation for this last book on the date that their certificates were requested from an IP address associated with Army Intelligence officials:
-At that time I was writing “Young Gunmen”, which deals with political violence during the transition to democracy, the time of the kidnapping of (Cristián) Edwards. I investigated DINE operations, which at that time followed the PDI, which in turn followed subversive groups. All this through consultations and unfiling of cases in the military prosecutor's offices.
Peña said that in 2012, when he was preparing his book on Pinochet's library, someone entered his house, but did not steal anything: “The computer was in another place from where I had it and the screen was on the floor of the my study. They moved my hard drive. My children's toys were left on top of their beds. They left all the closets open. It didn't seem like they were looking for anything, more like leaving a sign that someone had been there. There was no forced door or window." The journalist says that he filed a complaint with the PDI, but that he never had any news.
Juan Cristóbal Peña, journalist.
The electronic certificates of journalist Pascale Bonnefoy, correspondent for The New York Times and academic at the Institute of Communication and Image of the University of Chile, were requested on August 26 and 30, 2016. The journalist searched her files and detailed what he was investigating at the time:
-Between March and April 2016, I made six requests for the Transparency Law to the Army. One about the alleged investigation of file burning in 1989; on military prosecution cases in 1973; a third on the Military Intelligence Service of 1973; about the head of the interrogation service of the Armed Forces in 1973; another about an internal DINE investigation regarding the murder of Charles Horman in 1973 and the last one about the heads of different DINE departments in 1973. All this for the second updated edition of my book "Terrorismo de Estadio", published in September of 2016.
Shortly before, in July of that same year, the journalist recalled, she published in The Clinic the report "They ask to prosecute an aide-de-camp of the Chamber of Deputies for the execution of a detainee in 1973," based on documents from military files.
Pascale Bonnefoy, journalist (Source: ICEI University of Chile)
Santiago Pavlovic, the anchor journalist for TVN's Informe Especial, pointed out that since 2015 he has not stopped investigating military corruption. He told CIPER that during these years he has received requests to meet with different commanders-in-chief of the Army, and that there have also been letters and calls to his headquarters in the channel's press area, but that he has not received threats . Before, he says, there were. They occurred, he says, when he investigated issues related to repression during the dictatorship:
-There they called me on the phone and threatened me, but I did not make any complaint, instead I opted to take personal safeguards.
In the PDI report to which CIPER accessed, different emails appear requesting certificates from Pavlovic and also from members of his family. In 2015, the journalist worked at Informe Especial together with Mauricio Weibel in investigations into the military embezzlement known as "Milicogate."
Santiago Pavlovic, journalist.
Another journalist who was part of that Special Report team, Danae Fuster, also appears in the PDI report. An email requested a certificate from her to the Civil Registry on July 10, 2015. That day, the same email address requested a certificate from Sergio Tudesca, one of the ex-soldiers who denounced corruption in the Army.
Danae Fuster, journalist (Source: @Danae_Fuster's Twitter)
The fifth journalist featured in the PDI report is Javier Rebolledo, who has specialized in the investigation of human rights violations during the dictatorship. Rebolledo has published books such as “La danza de los cuervos”. Regarding their certificates, the PDI report indicates that they were required on two dates: October 28, 2016 and February 18, 2018.
-In October 2016, I was in the middle of the reporting period for “Chameleon, double life of a communist agent”, which tells the story of a communist who approached the intelligence services of the dictatorship to camouflage himself alongside them . I had to investigate former DINE officials, for which I met with one of them around December 20, 2016. However, this meeting had been brewing since the middle of that year. Later, in 2018, he was in the investigative part of the book "Los hijos del frío", related to the Simón Bolívar extermination center. In February I traveled to interview the key witness in cases against humanity against the military, Jorgelino Vergara. He told me, I don't know if with support, that I had follow-up.
Javier Rebolledo, journalist.
The journalist, who has just released his book "Rati" -about the role of "The Office" of La Moneda at the beginning of the Concertación governments-, assured that on the same day and at the same time that it was interviewed by the TVN program El Informante, for his investigation into the participation of Cristián Labbé (former mayor of Providencia) in DINA, the Ceibo publishing house, which had published the book in which these events were reported, was robbed . The thieves, he says, in addition to taking valuable equipment, left a singular mark: a row of bills arranged on the floor.
Journalist Mauricio Weibel has also denounced similar events. In the same week in 2012 that they entered the house of Juan Cristóbal Peña, Weibel assures that his computer and flash drives were stolen from his house. He has also recounted that, years later, when he was publishing his reports on “Milicogate” in The Clinic, the offices of that medium suffered a robbery in which computers were taken.