Charles Horman
Encyclopedia
Charles Horman was an American
journalist and was one of the victims of the 1973 Chilean coup d'état led by General Augusto Pinochet
, that deposed the socialist
president, Salvador Allende
, after bombing the Chilean presidential palace
on September 11, 1973. Horman's death was the subject of the 1982 Costa-Gavras
film Missing
.
, where he attended the Allen-Stevenson School
, from which he graduated in 1957. He then graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy
in 1960 and Harvard University
in 1964 and worked for a number of years in the U.S. media. In 1972, he settled temporarily in Chile to work as a freelance writer.
On September 17, 1973, six days after the military takeover, Horman was seized by Chilean soldiers and taken to the National Stadium
in Santiago
, which had been turned by the military into an ad hoc prison camp, where prisoners were interrogated, tortured and executed. The whereabouts of Horman's body were presumably undetermined, at least according to the Americans, for about a month following his death, although it was later determined that, after his execution, Horman's body was buried inside a wall in the national stadium. It later turned up in a morgue in the Chilean capital. However, a later DNA test determined that the corpse returned to his wife was not Horman's. His wife continues the search for his remains. A second American journalist, Frank Teruggi
, met with a similar fate.
At the time of the military coup, Horman was in the resort town of Viña del Mar
, near the port of Valparaíso, which was a key base for the American and Chilean coup plotters. US officials speculated at the time that Horman was a victim of "Chilean paranoia," but did nothing to intervene. It is unlikely that Horman would have been killed without a green light from the CIA, according to papers released in 1999 under the Freedom of Information Act. Efforts to determine his fate were initially met with resistance and duplicity by US embassy officials in Santiago.
(1982), directed by Greek
filmmaker Costa-Gavras
, starring Jack Lemmon
and Sissy Spacek
as Horman's father and wife, trying to discover his fate. Horman himself was portrayed by John Shea
. In the film Horman is depicted as having spoken with several U.S. operatives that assisted the Chilean military government. The film alleges that Horman's discovery of US complicity in the coup led to his secret arrest, disappearance, and execution.
American complicity in the Chilean coup was later confirmed in documents declassified during the Clinton administration
.
The film was based on a book first published under the title "The Execution of Charles Horman: An American Sacrifice" (1978) by Thomas Hauser
(it was later republished under the title Missing in 1982).
When the film was released by Universal Studios
, Nathaniel Davis
, United States Ambassador to Chile
from 1971 to 1973, filed a USD
150 million libel suit against the director and the studio, although he was not named directly in the movie (he had been named in the book). The court eventually dismissed Davis's suit. The film was removed from the market during the lawsuit but re-released upon dismissal of the suit.
In season 10 of Law & Order
, the season finale episode "Vaya Con Dios" was based on this murder.
Written by three State Department functionaries — Rudy Fimbres, R.S. Driscolle and W.V. Robertson and addressed to Harry Schlaudeman, a high-ranking official in the department's Latin American division — the August document described the Horman case as "bothersome," given reports in the press and Congressional investigations charging that the affair involved "negligence on our part, or worse, complicity in Horman's death." The State Department, the memo declared, had the responsibility to "categorically refute such innuendoes in defense of US officials." It went on, however, to acknowledge that these "innuendoes" were well founded.
The three State Department officials said they had evidence that "The GOC [Government of Chile] sought Horman and felt threatened enough to order his immediate execution. The GOC might have believed this American could be killed without negative fall-out from the USG [US Government]."
The report went on to declare that circumstantial evidence indicated "US intelligence may have played an unfortunate part in Horman's death. At best it was limited to providing or confirming information that helped motivate his murder by the GOC. At worst, US intelligence was aware the GOC saw Horman in a rather serious light and US officials did nothing to discourage the logical outcome of GOC paranoia."
After the release of the State Department memo, Horman's widow, Joyce, described it as "close to a smoking pistol." The same memo had been released to the Horman family more than twenty years earlier, but the above-mentioned paragraphs had been blacked out by the State Department. The latest version still has blacked-out passages, for reasons of "national security," but reveals more.
conducted an investigation into Charles Horman's death. Among five Americans who gave evidence was Joyce Horman, his widow who had filed a criminal suit against Augusto Pinochet the previous December. The investigation included a four-hour re-enactment of the scene in the National Stadium where Horman was killed, one of 10,000 who suffered there.
The judge also considered extradition proceedings for former U.S. Secretary of State
Henry Kissinger
after receiving no cooperation from him or Nathaniel Davis
to requests from the Supreme Court of Chile
. "At the time of his death, Horman was investigating the murder of René Schneider
, the Commander-in-Chief in the Chilean army whose support for Allende and the constitution was seen as an obstacle to the coup."
On November 29, 2011, a Chilean court indicted a retired U.S. military officer, Navy Captain Ray E. Davis, charging him with involvement in Horman's murder.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
journalist and was one of the victims of the 1973 Chilean coup d'état led by General Augusto Pinochet
Augusto Pinochet
Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte, more commonly known as Augusto Pinochet , was a Chilean army general and dictator who assumed power in a coup d'état on 11 September 1973...
, that deposed the socialist
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
president, Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende Gossens was a Chilean physician and politician who is generally considered the first democratically elected Marxist to become president of a country in Latin America....
, after bombing the Chilean presidential palace
Presidential Palace
A Presidential Palace is the official residence of the president in some countries. However, some countries do not call the official residence of a head of state a presidential palace...
on September 11, 1973. Horman's death was the subject of the 1982 Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras, is a Greek filmmaker, who lives and works in France, best known for films with overt political themes, most famously the fast-paced thriller, Z...
film Missing
Missing (film)
Missing is a 1982 American drama film directed by Costa Gavras, and starring Jack Lemmon, Sissy Spacek, Melanie Mayron, John Shea, Charles Cioffi and Janice Rule...
.
Biography
Horman was born and raised in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, where he attended the Allen-Stevenson School
Allen-Stevenson School
Allen-Stevenson is a private boys elementary school located at 132 East 78th Street in New York City, New York.- History :The Allen School was founded in 1883 by Francis Bellows Allen at a home on Fifth Avenue and 57th Street. Its first class enrolled only three boys. In 1885, the school moved to...
, from which he graduated in 1957. He then graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy
Phillips Exeter Academy
Phillips Exeter Academy is a private secondary school located in Exeter, New Hampshire, in the United States.Exeter is noted for its application of Harkness education, a system based on a conference format of teacher and student interaction, similar to the Socratic method of learning through asking...
in 1960 and Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
in 1964 and worked for a number of years in the U.S. media. In 1972, he settled temporarily in Chile to work as a freelance writer.
On September 17, 1973, six days after the military takeover, Horman was seized by Chilean soldiers and taken to the National Stadium
Estadio Nacional de Chile
The Estadio Nacional Julio Martínez Prádanos is the national stadium of Chile, and is located in the Ñuñoa district of Santiago). It is the largest stadium in Chile with an official capacity of 47,000, and is part of a 62 ha sporting complex which also features tennis courts, an aquatics center, a...
in Santiago
Santiago, Chile
Santiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level...
, which had been turned by the military into an ad hoc prison camp, where prisoners were interrogated, tortured and executed. The whereabouts of Horman's body were presumably undetermined, at least according to the Americans, for about a month following his death, although it was later determined that, after his execution, Horman's body was buried inside a wall in the national stadium. It later turned up in a morgue in the Chilean capital. However, a later DNA test determined that the corpse returned to his wife was not Horman's. His wife continues the search for his remains. A second American journalist, Frank Teruggi
Frank Teruggi
Frank Teruggi, Jr. was an American student and journalist who became one of the victims of the American-backed General Augusto Pinochet's military shortly after the September 11, 1973 Pinochet coup d'etat against Socialist President Salvador Allende....
, met with a similar fate.
At the time of the military coup, Horman was in the resort town of Viña del Mar
Viña del Mar
Viña del Mar , is a city and commune on central Chile's Pacific coast. Its long stretches of white sandy beaches are a major attraction for national and international tourists. The city is Chile's main tourist attraction. Known as "La Ciudad Jardín" , Viña del Mar is a Chilean Municipality located...
, near the port of Valparaíso, which was a key base for the American and Chilean coup plotters. US officials speculated at the time that Horman was a victim of "Chilean paranoia," but did nothing to intervene. It is unlikely that Horman would have been killed without a green light from the CIA, according to papers released in 1999 under the Freedom of Information Act. Efforts to determine his fate were initially met with resistance and duplicity by US embassy officials in Santiago.
Book, film, and television depictions of the case
The Horman case was made into the Hollywood film MissingMissing (film)
Missing is a 1982 American drama film directed by Costa Gavras, and starring Jack Lemmon, Sissy Spacek, Melanie Mayron, John Shea, Charles Cioffi and Janice Rule...
(1982), directed by Greek
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
filmmaker Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras, is a Greek filmmaker, who lives and works in France, best known for films with overt political themes, most famously the fast-paced thriller, Z...
, starring Jack Lemmon
Jack Lemmon
John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...
and Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek is an American actress and singer. She came to international prominence for her for role as Carrie White in Brian De Palma's 1976 horror film Carrie for which she earned her first Academy Award nomination...
as Horman's father and wife, trying to discover his fate. Horman himself was portrayed by John Shea
John Shea
John Victor Shea III is an American actor and director who has starred on stage, television and in film. He is best known for his role as Lex Luthor in the 1990s TV series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman and also starred in the short lived 1990s TV series WIOU as Hank Zaret...
. In the film Horman is depicted as having spoken with several U.S. operatives that assisted the Chilean military government. The film alleges that Horman's discovery of US complicity in the coup led to his secret arrest, disappearance, and execution.
American complicity in the Chilean coup was later confirmed in documents declassified during the Clinton administration
Presidency of Bill Clinton
The United States Presidency of Bill Clinton, also known as the Clinton Administration, was the executive branch of the federal government of the United States from January 20, 1993 to January 20, 2001. Clinton was the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win a second full term...
.
The film was based on a book first published under the title "The Execution of Charles Horman: An American Sacrifice" (1978) by Thomas Hauser
Thomas Hauser
Thomas Hauser is an American author.He made his debut as a writer in 1978 with The Execution of Charles Horman; An American Sacrifice. Horman's wife, Joyce and father, Ed Horman cooperated with Hauser on the book describing both the fate of Charles and his family's quest to uncover the truth in...
(it was later republished under the title Missing in 1982).
When the film was released by Universal Studios
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
, Nathaniel Davis
Nathaniel Davis
Nathaniel Davis A well known career diplomat who served in the United States Foreign Service and the Peace Corps for 36 years. His final years were spent teaching.-Early years:...
, United States Ambassador to Chile
United States Ambassador to Chile
The following is a list of Ambassadors that the United States has sent to Chile. The current title given by the United States State Department to this position is Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary.-See also:*Chile – United States relations...
from 1971 to 1973, filed a USD
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
150 million libel suit against the director and the studio, although he was not named directly in the movie (he had been named in the book). The court eventually dismissed Davis's suit. The film was removed from the market during the lawsuit but re-released upon dismissal of the suit.
In season 10 of Law & Order
Law & Order
Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...
, the season finale episode "Vaya Con Dios" was based on this murder.
State department memo
For many years thereafter, the US government steadfastly maintained its ignorance of the affair. However, in October 1999, Washington finally released a document admitting that CIA agents played a role in his death. The State Department memo, dated August 25, 1976, was declassified on October 8, 1999, together with 1,100 other documents released by various US agencies which dealt primarily with the years leading up to the military coup.Written by three State Department functionaries — Rudy Fimbres, R.S. Driscolle and W.V. Robertson and addressed to Harry Schlaudeman, a high-ranking official in the department's Latin American division — the August document described the Horman case as "bothersome," given reports in the press and Congressional investigations charging that the affair involved "negligence on our part, or worse, complicity in Horman's death." The State Department, the memo declared, had the responsibility to "categorically refute such innuendoes in defense of US officials." It went on, however, to acknowledge that these "innuendoes" were well founded.
The three State Department officials said they had evidence that "The GOC [Government of Chile] sought Horman and felt threatened enough to order his immediate execution. The GOC might have believed this American could be killed without negative fall-out from the USG [US Government]."
The report went on to declare that circumstantial evidence indicated "US intelligence may have played an unfortunate part in Horman's death. At best it was limited to providing or confirming information that helped motivate his murder by the GOC. At worst, US intelligence was aware the GOC saw Horman in a rather serious light and US officials did nothing to discourage the logical outcome of GOC paranoia."
After the release of the State Department memo, Horman's widow, Joyce, described it as "close to a smoking pistol." The same memo had been released to the Horman family more than twenty years earlier, but the above-mentioned paragraphs had been blacked out by the State Department. The latest version still has blacked-out passages, for reasons of "national security," but reveals more.
Chilean Investigation
In 2001, Chilean judge Juan Guzmán TapiaJuan Guzmán Tapia
Juan Salvador Guzmán Tapia is a retired Chilean judge who gained international recognition for being the first judge to prosecute former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet on human rights charges, after Pinochet's return to Chile following more than a year of house arrest in London, in...
conducted an investigation into Charles Horman's death. Among five Americans who gave evidence was Joyce Horman, his widow who had filed a criminal suit against Augusto Pinochet the previous December. The investigation included a four-hour re-enactment of the scene in the National Stadium where Horman was killed, one of 10,000 who suffered there.
The judge also considered extradition proceedings for former U.S. Secretary of State
United States Secretary of State
The United States Secretary of State is the head of the United States Department of State, concerned with foreign affairs. The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet and the highest-ranking cabinet secretary both in line of succession and order of precedence...
Henry Kissinger
Henry Kissinger
Heinz Alfred "Henry" Kissinger is a German-born American academic, political scientist, diplomat, and businessman. He is a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He served as National Security Advisor and later concurrently as Secretary of State in the administrations of Presidents Richard Nixon and...
after receiving no cooperation from him or Nathaniel Davis
Nathaniel Davis
Nathaniel Davis A well known career diplomat who served in the United States Foreign Service and the Peace Corps for 36 years. His final years were spent teaching.-Early years:...
to requests from the Supreme Court of Chile
Supreme Court of Chile
The Supreme Court of Chile is the highest court in Chile. It also administrates the lower courts in the nation. It is located in the capital Santiago....
. "At the time of his death, Horman was investigating the murder of René Schneider
René Schneider
General René Schneider Chereau was the commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army at the time of the 1970 Chilean presidential election, when he was assassinated during a botched kidnapping attempt. His murder virtually assured Salvador Allende's eventual overthrow and death in a coup three years later...
, the Commander-in-Chief in the Chilean army whose support for Allende and the constitution was seen as an obstacle to the coup."
On November 29, 2011, a Chilean court indicted a retired U.S. military officer, Navy Captain Ray E. Davis, charging him with involvement in Horman's murder.
See also
- 1970 Chilean presidential election
- Operation CondorOperation CondorOperation Condor , was a campaign of political repression involving assassination and intelligence operations officially implemented in 1975 by the right-wing dictatorships of the Southern Cone of South America...
- U.S. intervention in Chile
- Chilean political scandalsChilean political scandalsA political scandal is a kind of political corruption that is exposed and becomes a scandal, in which politicians or government officials are accused of engaging in various illegal, corrupt, or unethical practices...
- United States intervention in Chile#1973 coup
- Memoriaviva (Complete list of Victims, Torture Centres and Criminals - in Spanish)
- Jeffrey DavidowJeffrey DavidowJeffrey Davidow is a career foreign service officer from the U.S. state of Virginia. Davidow has served as a member of the Senior Foreign Service, as well as having been the U.S. Ambassador to Zambia, Venezuela, and Mexico....
External links
- State Dept. Memos regarding Horman (both the blacked-out version given to the family and the more complete version released in 1999)