Ramón Juan Alberto Camps (25 January 1927 – 22 August 1994) was an

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, ...

general and the head of the Buenos Aires Provincial Police during the

National Reorganization Process The National Reorganization Process (Spanish: ''Proceso de Reorganización Nacional'', often simply ''el Proceso'', "the Process") was the military dictatorship that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983, in which it was supported by the United St ...

(1976–1983). Although he was found guilty of multiple crimes, he was first amnestied and then

pardon A pardon is a government decision to allow a person to be relieved of some or all of the legal consequences resulting from a criminal conviction. A pardon may be granted before or after conviction for the crime, depending on the laws of the j ...

ed.

Illegal detention centers and kidnappings

Camps, then a colonel, led the police of

Buenos Aires Province Buenos Aires (), officially the Buenos Aires Province (''Provincia de Buenos Aires'' ), is the largest and most populous Argentine province. It takes its name from the city of Buenos Aires, the capital of the country, which used to be part of th ...

between April 1976 and December 1977, and oversaw twenty illegal detention centers. During those twenty months, he was responsible for 214 extorsive

kidnapping In criminal law, kidnapping is the unlawful confinement of a person against their will, often including transportation/asportation. The asportation and abduction element is typically but not necessarily conducted by means of force or fear: the p ...

s, 120 cases of

torture Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. Some definitions are restricted to acts ...

, 32

homicide Homicide occurs when a person kills another person. A homicide requires only a volitional act or omission that causes the death of another, and thus a homicide may result from accidental, reckless, or negligent acts even if there is no inten ...

s, two

rape Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or ...

s, two

miscarriage Miscarriage, also known in medical terms as a spontaneous abortion and pregnancy loss, is the death of an embryo or fetus before it is able to survive independently. Miscarriage before 6 weeks of gestation is defined by ESHRE as biochemica ...

s caused by torture, 18 acts of theft, and the appropriation (for illegal adoption) of 10 minors. Terra Actualidad, 18 March 2006
Ramón Camps: el peor de todos
Camps led the operation known as the Night of the Pencils, in September 1976, on which 10 students suspected of being

Montoneros Montoneros ( es, link=no, Movimiento Peronista Montonero-MPM) was an Argentine left-wing Peronist guerrilla organization, active throughout the 1970s and early 1980s. The name is an allusion to the 19th-century cavalry militias called Montone ...

were kidnapped, tortured, and killed or released months or years later. He was also responsible for the kidnapping, torture and confinement of journalist

Jacobo Timerman Jacobo Timerman (6 January 1923 – 11 November 1999), was a Soviet-born Argentine publisher, journalist, and author, who is most noted for his confronting and reporting the atrocities of the Argentine military regime's Dirty War during a perio ...

, who published the left-leaning newspaper ''La Opinión''. Timerman was eventually released and deported in 1979, as the military command caved in to international pressure.

Prison sentence and amnesty

In December 1986, three years after the end of the dictatorship, he was sentenced to a 25-year term in prison, but he benefited from the amnesty granted to all but the higher officials by the

law of Due Obedience The Law of Due Obedience ( es, Ley de obediencia debida) was a law passed by the National Congress of Argentina after the end of the military dictatorship of the Proceso de Reorganización Nacional (which started with a coup d'état in 1976 and e ...

and the full stop law). His second-in-command, Miguel Etchecolatz, was also tried and granted these benefits, but was sentenced to a life term for

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...

in 2006, after the laws were repealed. The Catholic priest Cristian Von Wernich, former police

chaplain A chaplain is, traditionally, a cleric (such as a minister, priest, pastor, rabbi, purohit, or imam), or a lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secular institution (such as a hospital, prison, military unit, intelligence ...

and Camps' personal

confessor Confessor is a title used within Christianity in several ways. Confessor of the Faith Its oldest use is to indicate a saint who has suffered persecution and torture for the faith but not to the point of death.Raúl Alfonsín had focused on the nine commanders of the juntas, who were tried and sentenced on the understanding that they were to take the blame for all the crimes committed under their rule. Camps, however, had publicly acknowledged his responsibility in

human rights Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...

abuses of such nature that he brought justice on himself. The former police chief told '' Clarín'', in 1984, that he had used torture as a method of interrogation and orchestrated 5,000

forced disappearance An enforced disappearance (or forced disappearance) is the secret abduction or imprisonment of a person by a state or political organization, or by a third party with the authorization, support, or acquiescence of a state or political organi ...

s, and justified the appropriation of newborns from their imprisoned mothers "because subversive parents will raise subversive children". Camps enjoyed an effective amnesty as a result of the two "Pardon Laws", which limited the responsibility for most crimes of the dictatorship to the top of the command chain and voided further investigations. The rest of the case against him was voided, as with other military and police officers, by the series of pardons granted by President

Carlos Menem Carlos Saúl Menem (2 July 1930 – 14 February 2021) was an Argentine lawyer and politician who served as the President of Argentina from 1989 to 1999. Ideologically, he identified as a Peronist and supported economically liberal policies. He ...

in 1989 and 1990.

Public activities following amnesty

After retiring from the police command, Camps appeared frequently in the media to speak against Timerman,

Judaism Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in th ...

and

communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...

, as well as appearing as a commentator in the news show ''60 Minutos'' during the

Falklands War The Falklands War ( es, link=no, Guerra de las Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial ...

(1982). Together with First Army Corps Commander

Guillermo Suárez Mason Carlos Guillermo Suárez Mason (January 2, 1924 – June 21, 2005) was an Argentine military officer convicted for Dirty War crimes during the 1976–1983 military dictatorship. He was in charge of the Batallón de Inteligencia 601. Biography ...

he set up a company called SCA, ostensibly a coffee and fruit trader, but in fact only a facade for an arms company, which sold weapons to

counter-insurgency Counterinsurgency (COIN) is "the totality of actions aimed at defeating irregular forces". The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any "military or political action taken against the activities of guerrillas or revolutionar ...

forces in

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

. Upon the return of democratic rule, Camps wrote articles for the

far-right Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being ...

nationalist Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

magazine '' Cabildo'', and published a book on financist

David Graiver David Graiver (1941 — 1976) was an Argentine businessman and banker who was investigated in the 1970s for alleged money laundering of US$17 million for the Montoneros, a leftist guerrilla group. He was indicted for embezzlement after his rep ...

and about "the Zionist danger". Jorge Saborido, 2004
Antisemitism in the recent Argentine History: the Cabildo Magazine and the Jew conspiracy
. Camps died of

prostate cancer Prostate cancer is cancer of the prostate. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancerous tumor worldwide and is the fifth leading cause of cancer-related mortality among men. The prostate is a gland in the male reproductive system that su ...

on August 22, 1994, at the Military Hospital of Buenos Aires.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Camps, Ramon 1927 births 1994 deaths Operatives of the Dirty War Argentine generals Argentine police officers convicted of murder Argentine people convicted of crimes against humanity Recipients of Argentine presidential pardons Deaths from cancer in Argentina Place of birth missing Police officers convicted of crimes against humanity

Illegal detention centers and kidnappings

Prison sentence and amnesty

Public activities following amnesty

See also

References