BACK ISSUES

 It took Servando Jordan, a Supreme Court judge, just a few hours to read “The Black Book of Chilean Justice” in which he is mentioned. Offended, he petitioned the Appeals Court, which, in record time, named a judge who ordered the immediate seizure of the book.

 “…it’s for that reason that I – who is no different nor better than many colleagues who daily face the State Security Law – find myself in a strange city writing this letter.” Journalist Alejandra Matus, author of “The Black Book of Chilean Justice,” had arrived a few hours earlier in Buenos Aires on April 14 from Santiago, Chile. From the Argentine capital she thanked her Chilean colleagues for the unconditional support they had given her. Her imminent detention and the possibility of being jailed for no less than five years had forced her to flee Chile.

A few days earlier she had arrived from the United States with the intention of presenting her book. The event took place April 13 in a downtown hotel. Like other scarce journalistic books that denounce what has occurred in Chile, the book followed the traditional path towards a meeting with readers. But events unfolded with unusual speed and the following morning detectives arrived at the offices of Editorial Planeta Chilena with the mission to seize the book.

No favor

Judge Servando Jordan, a former president of the Supreme Court, felt aggrieved by his mention in the work and sought protection under the State Security Law. The law considers as offenses against public order allegations against top officials, judges, congressmen and chiefs of the armed forces. Judge Rafael Huerta of the Appeals Court started a process under article 6 (b) . The slowness of the Chilean courts is well known, especially by those who don’t have sufficient funds to hire a good lawyer. Cases pile up and are filed away in filing cabinets, ink yellowing and, in some cases, files get misplaced.

For that reason, Carlos Orellana, the manager of Planeta, was very surprised when his secretary told him that detectives were asking for the owner of the publishing house. His surprise rooted in the unexpected speed with which the court acted. It could be said the court reacted simultaneously with the appearance of the book.

Both Orellana and the author were aware of the risks they faced. There have been thousands of charges against journalists for abuse and injury involving publications. Generally the cases proceed slowly and the final disposition is uncertain. Consequently, they thought this charge would have the same fate.

The second surprise that morning of April 14 came when they learned that the charge was violation of the State Security Law and not a simple case of abuse. Orellana said this was more than he had expected, so he handed over all 1,000 copies of the book that had been printed.

Orellana says everything is on hold at present. Planeta’s lawyer, Hernan Montealegre, challenged the applicability of the law, based on a contradiction between the State Security Law, promulgated in 1958, and the Constitution of 1980.

According to legal norms, the Constitution supersedes any previous laws that might be contradictory. So the case has a unconstitutional aspect. Meanwhile, the case is under study, even though the charge might be dropped and the book allowed to circulate.

For Orellana, one thing is clear: he and Matus agree that no arrangement will be accepted that obliges her to apologize, as has happened with other cases. He says categorically that this is not open to discussion.

The publisher feels the decision of the judge was clearly wrong. He says the mention of the judge would have been known by three or four thousand readers but now hundreds of thousands know about it. The judge has done him a favor by making him the object of public interest, he knows that his name has became part of the public heritage and that everyone is interested in what is going to happen.

While the books have been seized, local news media have been thoroughly covering the event. Television stations sent camera crews to the warehouse and filmed the detectives as they carried away the books; they also covered Matus, departure at the airport. The Nuevo Mundo radio station carried on the air for various weeks selected excerpts from the book while the newspaper La Tercera put the complete text on the Internet.

The case has also received wide international coverage. CNN carried a report and El País of Spain published a detailed story. Human Rights watch issued an alert, as did journalism organizations.

Consequently, Jordan has done no favor for ex-president Augusto Pinochet, currently detained in England, who more than ever needs Chile’s judges to show a clean, transparent and reliable face while they administer justice with nobility and independence.

Power corrupts

The black cover of the book has a drawing of the three well-known monkeys who see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil. Inside, the 349 pages are distributed in six chapters of which the first, “Degraded Power,” takes up a third of the book. There is a panoramic view of thievery, complicity and other corruption. Jordan appears here, although he’s not the only one; there are half a dozen other judges, some of whom are retired, says Orellana.

Although brief, the two other powerful chapters are the fourth, “The Rites of Power,”which describes the reactions, emotions and unethical actions of the judiciary during the military coup [that brought Pinochet to power] and the following years; and the following, “Docudrama in Five Acts,” in which Human Rights cases are mentioned as well as the complacent, fearful and submissive attitude of the judges. The index contains around 500 names of persons mentioned in the book.

Alejandra Matus spent nearly six years working in the book. With great detail she gathered together, step by step, the material that enabled her to produce a complex and courageous work of investigative journalism. Coverage of the courts allowed her to learn of the shocking reality that became necessary to reveal.

As one reads the book, one becomes convinced of the need for a deep, radical change in the Chilean judicial system because until now corruption has seeped out from all angles. The author says that in the last years signs can be seen of a recovery that is coming slowly but surely. But she warns that there is still much that has been swept under the rug.

A window on free expression

The risks that Chilean journalists run in their aspirations to rescue the truth and offer it without subterfuge to the public is not new. The precarious balancing act is an historic constant that was heightened as of the military coup. Persecution and censorship generated self-censorship, which quickly occurred at that time. The return of democracy has not alleviated the authoritarian hand, while journalists, boxed in, debate the State Security Law, the Published Abuses Law, prohibitions on informing, the lack of protection for sources, etc.

It is that situation, which generates a charged atmosphere, lacking transparency and prone to corruption, that publications like “The Black Book of Chilean Justice” seek to change. Success would contribute to the recovery of health by Chilean society, so destroyed in the last three decades in terms of getting along together and respect for Human Rights.

Thus the importance of opening national space so that young journalists, who seek to untie the bonds of self-censurship and gag laws, have the possibility of expressing themselves freely. On that point, Orellana says: “We would like to see work along that line developed and maintained. Above all because the written press – newspapers and magazines – don’t offer journalists much possibility of open, different, dissident expression. The ideal would be that books could open that window of information in the freest way. With this case, the possibilities for young journalists to do such things are emphasized. All of a sudden one finds that young journalists are squashed, like they don’t speak out or go further than reproduce the opinions of the authorities. From that point of view, I feel that this experience can be useful, an opening to other things. I would like it to be so.”

The author, in the letter she sent to local journalists, says the same thing when she points out: “The decision to seize the book has uncovered pending debates, making freedom of expression a flag. I can’t become sad over this. Less even, if I believe as I do, that we will win and soon journalists will have fewer limits on their work."