Court Upholds Pinochet Detention, Indictment

SANTIAGO, Chile – Chile's Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the indictment and house arrest of former dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet (search) for nine kidnappings and one homicide allegedly committed during a long regime marked by human rights abuses.

The court's 3-2 vote set the stage for another legal battle stemming from Pinochet's 1973-1990 rule.

"The sentence that has been appealed has been confirmed," court secretary Carlos Meneses said, referring to Pinochet's appeal.

A small group of Pinochet supporters were removed from the court by guards as they shouted slogans interrupting Meneses' announcement.

The ruling prompted applause and cheers from gathered relatives of alleged victims of Pinochet's regime.

"We are happy, the entire world is happy," said Lorena Pizarro, president of an association of relatives of dissidents who killed during Pinochet's reign. "Pinochet cannot continue to live in impunity."

Pinochet remained at his countryside residence west of Santiago, where he will remain under house arrest during the trial. He has been there recovering from a stroke he suffered in December.

Tuesday's ruling upheld only the legality of the historic Dec. 13 indictment and house arrest ordered by judge Juan Guzman (search). That December order was questioned by Pinochet's defense lawyers, who claim the 89-year-old is unfit to stand trial because of his deteriorated health.

There was no immediate reaction to Tuesday's ruling from Pinochet's lawyers or associates, who now prepare for a new legal effort to have the charges dropped.

Guzman charged Pinochet with nine kidnappings and one homicide in the so-called Operation Condor, a joint plan by the dictatorships that ruled several South American nations in the 1970s and 1980s to suppress dissent.

Seven of the kidnapping victims were seized in Argentina, one in Paraguay and one in Bolivia, while one man was killed in Chile, according to the charges filed by Guzman.

The Supreme Court in 2002 struck down another indictment filed by Guzman against Pinochet on other human rights cases after doctors diagnosed the former dictator with a moderate case of dementia, a condition Pinochet's lawyers insist has worsened.

But judges rejected those arguments after seeing Pinochet in several situations, including an interview with a Miami-based Spanish-language TV station in which he appeared lucid.

Pinochet has several other legal cases pending. He is being investigated by a judge after a U.S. Senate investigative committee disclosed that he kept as much as $8 million in secret accounts at Riggs Bank in Washington.

A court also stripped him of his immunity from prosecution for the 1974 assassination in Argentina of Gen. Carlos Prats, his predecessor as Chilean army commander who opposed his 1973 coup. Prats and his wife were killed by a bomb that blew up their car.