Chile charges 7 in Pinochet-era death of photographer

Seven ex-military men were indicted Friday in Chile over the 1986 killing of a photographer doused with gasoline and set ablaze by soldiers during a protest against then-ruler Augusto Pinochet.

The crime is considered one of the most grisly committed under the dictatorship of General Pinochet, who waged a brutal campaign against leftist dissenters both real and perceived.

More than 3,000 people died or disappeared under the right-wing regime.

An engineering student named Carmen Gloria Quintana was also set ablaze along with photographer Rodrigo Rojas. She lived, but was horribly disfigured. Both were just 19.

Six of the detainees were charged as suspected authors of the crime and the last as an accomplice, said Judge Mario Carroza.

The alleged authors are the former officers and non-commissioned officers that were in charge of the patrol that allegedly set the youths on fire. The driver of the truck the others had ridden in is the accused accomplice, the judge said.

All seven were arrested on Wednesday after a former soldier came forward and testified about what happened during the protest march on July 2, 1986.

Pinochet seized power in 1973 in a military coup that overthrew president Salvador Allende, and ruled until 1990, although he stayed for eight more years on as head of the military, which gave him immunity from prosecution. Pinochet died in 2006.