Published at: 02/09/2026 09:00 PM

SHOOTINGS AT THE PLANT CHECKPOINT

(CLARÍN, August 31, 1963)

• On August 30, 1963, a commission of members of the Chamber of the Municipal Council of the Federal District denounced the secret shootings carried out during the previous morning by agents of the General Directorate of Police (DIGEPOL), after having incited prisoners to carry out a prison disturbance inside the cells of the Retén de La Planta.
• The commission, chaired by the lawyer and councilor for the Federal District Rosa de Ratto Ciarlo, launched an S.O.S to public opinion to stop the ongoing summary executions of the detainees in that prison and prevent the mass sending of political leaders, young people and children to the mobile colonies of El Dorado.
• In this regard, Ratto Ciarlo publicly urged the President of the Chamber of Deputies to put an end to the night shootings and torture applied to prisoners.
• She also complained that, during the inspection carried out by a committee of councilors that she personally chaired, she managed to prevent three underage children from being sent to the jungles of Guiana, in the state of Bolivar.
• The list of some of the prisoners shot, given to the press by her includes:
  • Ambrosio Urbano Nieves
  • Miguel Ángel Covas
  • Rafael Ángel Covas
  • Maximiliano Bustamante
• Five officers of the General Directorate of Police (DIGEPOL) were responsible for the prison riot caused to justify the night shootings and the sending of the detainees to the concentration camps of El Dorado. In the best Nazi style.
• During the mutiny, amid the confusion, DIGEPOL officials agreed to tie white headscarves to their heads as identification to avoid shooting at each other.
• Carlos Andrés Pérez was Minister of Internal Relations. During his administration, more than 7,000 people were arbitrarily arrested, more than 1,500 politically persecuted arrested and tortured, authorized the crimes committed by the disastrous DIGEPOL, slandered, defamed and brought State violence to the highest level of all time. In the National Congress he was known as “The Assassin Minister”.
• The La Planta police checkpoint was, by orders of Rómulo Betancourt, converted into a warehouse for human beings, arbitrarily arrested in violent raids, carried out mainly in popular neighborhoods against any person or group of “suspects”.

Mazo News Team