Julia del Carmen Chuñil Catricura is a Chilean environmental activist of Mapuche ethnicity who currently presides over the Putreguel Indigenous Community. She is recognized for her work in defending native forests and protecting ancestral Mapuche lands in the commune of Máfil, in the Chilean region of Los Ríos.
On November 8, 2024, Julia disappeared in the commune of Máfil under circumstances yet to be clarified. On that day, she went to the territory “Reserva Cora Número Uno-A” with her sheepdog in search of some lost animals. She has not been seen since.
One of her sons explained that, while searching for his mother, he found tire marks from a pickup truck, an “unusual” vehicle in the region, which raised suspicions. Julia‘s house is a simple cabin, without electricity, running water, or cell phone signal, in an isolated area of the Valdivian temperate rainforest in southern Chile.
Since then, her family has continued to search for her. What began as a distressing disappearance has transformed into an investigation marked by irregularities, conflicting versions of events, and growing suspicions of criminalization. The case, which is currently causing tension in the Los Ríos Region, has been in the hands of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, first led by prosecutor Carlos Bahamondes and currently by his successor, Alejandro Ríos.
On November 10, a stick and a cushion were found in a “mediagua” (a small temporary shelter). The next day, the family filed a report for possible disappearance. Local residents stated that there were indications that the activist had been forcibly taken, including pickup truck tire marks, an unusual vehicle in that location.However, the strongest evidence was lost due to rain. Search operations were carried out in the following weeks.
On December 8, the activist’s family, along with the NGO Escazú Ahora, formalized a criminal complaint against all possible responsible parties for the disappearance, even without knowing exactly who is behind the facts. This measure aims to ensure that authorities initiate a broad investigation to identify and hold the culprits accountable once they are found.
On January 30, 2025, shortly after 2:00 p.m., Carabineros (Police) and personnel from the Prosecutor’s Office raided a home in Huichaco Sur, a rural area of the Máfil commune in the Los Ríos Region. The operation targeted the home of Jeannette Troncoso Chuñil, one of Julia‘s daughters, and included a large contingent from the GOPE (Government of the People’s Party), IAPA (Institutionalized Public Prosecutor’s Office), Labocar (Laboratories), and officials from the Public Prosecutor’s Office. Meanwhile, her brothers Pablo and Javier were in the so-called “recovery house.” No one in the family imagined that day would mark a new turning point in an investigation that, rather than providing answers, seemed to increase the number of questions.
On February 14, Pablo San Martín, Julia‘s son, declared that searches in the region had already been suspended and that the focus of the investigation had shifted to the activist’s sister, Jeanette, who, according to statements from her partner and the disappeared woman’s brother-in-law, came to be considered one of the suspects.
Following the January 10 operation, the Valdivia Court of Appeals rejected an appeal filed by Julia‘s relatives, who claimed the search at Jeannette’s home was illegal. In response to this ruling, part of the defense filed an appeal, challenging one of the main arguments used by the Prosecutor’s Office to justify the procedure: the alleged discovery of a piece of clothing with blood on it.
On January 30, while Pablo and Javier were at the Indigenous land reclamation center, a large-scale police operation was deployed at Jeannette Troncoso Chuñil’s home. It was during this time that Jeannette disappeared for several hours. Her family, without any official information, searched for her without success.
According to her testimony, at the beginning of the proceedings, a Labocar (Carabineros Criminalistics Laboratory) officer named Arriagada approached her and asked to talk for a few minutes. Jeannette accepted, unaware that she would be taken to a white van, where an informal but intense interrogation began. What she thought would be a brief conversation turned into an episode of harassment that, according to the defense, seriously violated her rights.
During the interrogation, Jeannette recounts that she was pressured to confess to a crime she didn’t commit. The conversation, which took place in the presence of the Los Ríos regional prosecutor, Tatiana Esquivel, escalated in tone and intensity. She recounted this in her statement:
“When your mother went missing, you were the only ones here. You are responsible. Tell the truth, that your husband was the one who did it to your mother. Because there’s blood inside, there’s everything, he told me. And you can’t be lying. And today we got your mother out of here.”
“And I said to him, how are they going to get her out? We’ve searched so much here. And I said, we’re going to find her right now. What else is going to happen? No, he told me. We’re getting her out today, he told me. And you’re still denying it? He told me, confess to the crime you committed. Confess.”
And he continues:
“And I kept insisting and insisting. That I confess and say it was us. And I told him, but my mom left here. My mom didn’t get lost here, I told him. My mom left with her friend over there. And I saw her when I was going there. No, she told me there are witnesses. There are witnesses who say her mom never left here. That her mom got lost here and didn’t leave. So you have to tell the truth. And there she was, going on and on, telling me that I had to tell the truth. What she wanted to say, what she wanted me to say, was that it was my husband and me. And confess, and confess. And all of a sudden she pulled out her gun. And that made me feel sick, I started shivering. Because I said, he’s going to point it at me. From his holster. Yes, he pulled it out, that’s it. And he told me, tell the truth, if you have to tell the truth. And besides, the prosecutor’s here, he told me. And she’s a woman, she’s going to understand. You’re going to, tell her, trust her. That’s what I told her, trust her and tell her the truth. Because she’s a woman and she’ll understand you more than I will.”
“The prosecutor then tells him: ‘Tell me, if you want to tell me something and you trust me, tell me.’ That’s the only time she speaks. ‘No,’ I told her, ‘I’m already saying everything there is. I have nothing more to say, I’m telling the truth.’ Fine. Arriagada gets out of the car and says: ‘Take her to Máfil immediately.'”
Attorney Karina Riquelme, who took on Pablo San Martín Chuñil’s defense in April, noted that a review of the case’s background revealed her client’s fear of being framed. In her opinion, the searches and investigations carried out by the Carabineros had exceeded the limits of what, in her opinion and that of the family, should be considered legally acceptable.
For Riquelme, the officers’ purpose was clear: to pressure Jeannette into incriminating herself in her mother’s eventual death. He explained that during the interrogation, they insisted that the body would be found that same day, and that there was already evidence of blood in the house, in order to force a confession.
For her part, Mariela Santana, a lawyer for the Corporation for the Promotion and Defense of People’s Rights (CODEPU), told Diario UChile that the complaints filed by the defense target both Carabineros officials and regional prosecutor Tatiana Esquivel.
According to the organization, the events described constitute—in its opinion—the crime of unlawful coercion in the context of one of the raids carried out against the Chuñil family. Santana explained that Jeannette Troncoso was threatened, forcibly transported in a police van, and that both her family and her lawyer were unaware of her whereabouts for several hours, while she was subjected to intimidation by police officers, all in the presence of the prosecutor. “This cannot happen again,” he concluded.
