July 15, 1985. The hearing is presided over by Judge León C. Arslanian. *Minute 35 of the original ruling. * ℹ️ Dr. Mignone was the father of Mónica María Candelaria Mignone, who disappeared on May 14, 1976, along with a group of Catholic militants who were carrying out pastoral tasks in the town of Bajo Flores (Autonomous City of Buenos Aires). Along with Mónica Mignone, María Marta Vásquez Ocampo de Lugones, César Amadeo Lugones, Beatriz C. Carbonell de Pérez Weiss and Horacio Pérez Weiss, María Esther Lorusso and Marta Mónica Quinteiro, all Catholic militants who worked in the aforementioned town, were kidnapped. In this “Exercise for Memory” we also publish the testimony of Navy Captain ® Oscar Quinteiro, father of another of the aforementioned victims. The development of ecclesiastical and political tasks in shantytowns was a common practice in the years prior to 1976, but not a month and a half after the dictatorship was established, given the insecurity caused by political activism. Days later, on May 23, priests Orlando Yorio and Francisco Jálics were kidnapped in the same shantytown along with eight catechists. The repressive force belonged to the ESMA. This happened a few days after Cardinal Juan C. Aramburu revoked the license to officiate mass from priest Yorio, in a clear message of disapproval of the work of the “shantytown priests.” Both Yorio and Jálics were released five months later, on October 23, 1976. The first four days they were held captive in the ESMA and the rest of the almost five months, in a house owned by the Navy in Don Torcuato (AMBA north). Emilio Mignone's social position allowed him to interview members of the armed forces and the church, which was forbidden to the vast majority of relatives of the disappeared. Personally, Dr. Mignone was a man linked to the church. He had been an official in the area of ​​Education during the administration of Governor Domingo Mercante (province of Buenos Aires, 1946-1952) and was Undersecretary of Education during the dictatorship of Juan C. Onganía (1966-1970). When the coup of March 24 occurred, he was Rector of the National University of Luján. As a result of the disappearance of his daughter, he was an active member of the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights (APDH) and then one of the founders in 1979 of the Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS). In his testimony, Emilio F. Mignone recounts the operation to kidnap his daughter and expresses his belief that a systematic plan of extermination was being developed, the central method of which was the forced disappearance of persons (minutes 14' and 56'45”), although this figure had not yet been legislated. Mignone testifies on central issues that may seem obvious today but that were not so obvious in 1985: His assertion that the forced disappearance of persons was applied systematically. He underlines this by recounting his conversation with Admiral Eduardo R. Fracassi (minutes 54'-40”), in which the latter defends that criminal method. The versions about the children of the disappeared or those born in captivity (minutes 20' – ​​22'30”) are based on the statements of General José A. Vaquero, who stated that the children of the disappeared “should not grow up with hatred for the armed forces.” Although the issue of the sons and daughters of the disappeared is widely known today, this type of version was not so well known in 1985, the year in which the present trial was held. The attitude of the members of the armed forces towards the sons and daughters of their peers who were political activists was that they were not given any different treatment. This emerges from the conversation that Mignone had with Colonel Roberto L. Rualdés (minute 43'). Likewise, there are many anecdotes that occurred in the search for his daughter. Mignone published in 1986 the book “Church and Dictatorship”, in which he denounces the members of the church that were complicit in the dictatorship and highlights the members committed to their fellow man, some of whom are now martyrs. Precisely in this “Exercise for Memory” we publish two antagonistic testimonies: that of Monsignor Esteban Hesayne and that of the priest Christian F. Von Wernich. Emilio F. Mignone died in 1998. His daughter remains missing. Follow us on our networks ⬇️ Instagram and Meta: @PersonasDesaparecidasBA Twitter: @PerDesBsAs #46yearsofthecoup #Argentina1985 #Memory #Truth #Justice #ExerciseforMemory #MemoryTruthAndJustice #NeverAgain #Son30Thousand #memorynetworks