The Trial of the Juntas (Spanish, Juicio a las Juntas) was the judicial trial of the members of the de facto military government that ruled Argentina during the dictatorship of the Proceso de Reorganización Nacional, which lasted from 1976 to 1983. Those on trial were:
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The Trial of the Juntas began on April 22, 1985, during the presidential administration of Raúl Alfonsín. The main prosecutors were Julio César Strassera and his assistant Luis Moreno Ocampo. The trial was presided by a group of six judges: León Arslanián, Jorge Torlasco, Ricardo Gil Lavedra, Andrés D'Alessio, Jorge Valerga Aráoz, and Guillermo Ledesma.
The dictatorship was in fact a series of several military governments under four military juntas. The fourth junta, before calling for elections and relinquishing power to the democratic authorities, enacted a Self-Amnesty Law on April 18, 1983, as well as a secret decree that dictated the destruction of much evidence of their past crimes.
Three days after his inauguration (December 13, 1983), President Alfonsín signed Decree No. 158, mandating the initiation of legal proceedings against the nine military officers of the first three junta, but not the fourth (ruled by General Reynaldo Bignone); leading members of the Montoneros and ERP guerrilla groups were also ordered indicted and tried, leading to numerous sentences. The National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons, established on December 15, presented 8,960 cases of the disappeared to the president on September 20, 1984. Following the refusal of a military court to try former junta members, Alfonsín established a National Criminal Court of Appeals for the purpose on October 14, 1984.
This trial, which officially began on April 22, 1985, is so far the only example of such a procedure and in such a scale against a former dictatorial government in Latin America. It was the first against a former dictatorship since the Nürnberg Trials, and the first to be conducted by a civilian court. It largely succeeded in proving the crimes of the juntas, which included forced disappearance, torture and murder of thousands of people. Opposition to the trial was largely limited to critical commentary by politicians, lawyers, and media figures sympathetic to the dictatorship, though it would also become violent: during the sentencing phase of the trial, 29 bomb threats were received in several Buenos Aires schools and a number of bombs were detonated in key government installations, including the Ministry of Defense. President Alfonsín declared a 60-day state of emergency on October 25.[1]
Prosecutors presented 709 cases, of which 280 were heard. A total of 833 witnesses testified during the cross-examination phase that lasted until August 14, including former President Alejandro Lanusse, writer Jorge Luis Borges, Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo President Estela Barnes de Carlotto, "Night of the Pencils" survivor Pablo Díaz, Carter Administration Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights Patricia M. Derian, Dutch jurist Theo van Boven, and renowned forensic anthropologist Clyde Snow.[2]
Closing arguments were heard on September 18, which chief prosecutor Strassera concluded by declaring that:
| “ | I wish to waive any claim to originality in closing this indictment. I wish to use a phrase that is not my own, because it already belongs to all the Argentine people. Your Honors: Never again! [2] | ” |
Sentencing was read on December 9. General Jorge Videla and Admiral Emilio Massera were sentenced to life imprisonment. General Roberto Viola: to 17 years in prison. Admiral Armando Lambruschini: eight years. General Orlando Agosti: four and a half years.
Omar Graffigna, Leopoldo Galtieri, Jorge Anaya and Basilio Lami Dozo were acquitted, though the latter three were concomitantly court martialed for malfeasance in waging the Falklands War of 1982. Charges against 600 others were brought to court, but these lawsuits were hampered by the Full Stop Law of 1986, which limited suits to those indicted within 60 days of the law's enactment, and the Law of Due Obedience of 1987, which effectively halted most remaining trials of Dirty War perpetrators.
Those sentenced or court-martialed were pardoned by President Carlos Menem in 1989 and 1990. President Néstor Kirchner obtained an Argentine Supreme Court ruling permitting extraditions in cases of crimes against humanity in 2003, as well as a 2005 ruling that the 1986 and 1987 laws shielding those accused in the crimes from prosecution are unconstitutional.[3] Consequently, and despite delays and ongoing threats against witnesses (including the disappearance of victim and witness Julio Jorge López), over 600 hitherto immune defendants faced criminal proceedings by 2010.[4] A total of 677 affidavits concerning civilians and servicemen killed in leftist terrorist acts were also filed.[5]
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