The criminal judge of Valparaiso to Señor Matta.
Valparaiso, November 3, 1891.
J.
Señor Minister: As you are aware, this court is at present, and has been since the 17th of October last, conducting with activity and zeal an investigative sumario in regard to the lamentable disorders which took place on the afternoon of the previous day in the Arrayan quarter of this port between sailors of the American cruiser Baltimore, Chilean sailors, and people of the town, with the unflinching purpose of investigating the real origin of those events, and applying in due time the fitting punishment to the persons who may be found responsible therefor, whatever may be their nationality.
In the course of the investigation this court, obeying the positive precepts of our laws of procedure, which prescribe that the judges of instruction in criminal cases shall endeavor to attain to the truth by all means within their reach, and keeping also in view a purpose of exalted impartiality and international courtesy, issued an order (decreto rule) directing that there be requested, in order to make use of them in the investigation, such details in regard to the occurrences above referred to as it might have been possible for the American consul and the commander of the Baltimore to collect, and the court notified the intendente of the province to obtain through his mediation the aforesaid details.
Under date of yesterday the intendente submitted to the court copies of the notes sent to him by those officers, wherein both of them excuse themselves from furnishing any particulars whatever, alleging that the matter had been brought to the cognizance of Mr. Patrick Egan, minister plenipotentiary of the United States in Santiago, by order of their Government. The commander of the Baltimore adds, moreover, for his part, that Mr. Egan could furnish, if requested to do so, a list of names of persons, who, in their turn, could state the names of other persons who witnessed the death of the sailor Riggin and the wounding of several other members of the crew of that cruiser.
This last suggestion of the commander constrains the undersigned to address himself to you in order to request, through the official channel of your department, the particulars which Mr. Egan may possess in regard to the disorders under examination, and especially the names of the witnesses to whom the aforesaid naval commander refers.
And, now, that I have had this opportunity to address you, I do not wish to let it pass without expressing to the minister the surprise which this court could not but feel that there should have been an attempt to make a vexatious international question out of an affair which, by reason of its nature, its characteristics, and its proportions, ought never, looking at things with a dispassionate judgment, to have left the halls of the court which was investigating it in conformity with the laws which, in our country, protect the rights of all without distinction of nationality.
Indeed, Señor Minister, in order that a common crime, defined and punished by our penal code, committed in our territory and in which foreign citizens have been concerned as responsible actors or as victims, could be removed from the ordinary and equal sphere of the courts of justice without evident wrong to our rights as a sovereign and civilized nation, and be carried into the craggy domain of diplomacy, it would be necessary for one of the following circumstances to have taken place:
- (1)
- That the authorities of the district or their responsible agents should have taken a personal and direct part in the offense.
- (2)
- That, it having been in the power of the said authorities or their agents to prevent the occurrence of the event, or its later consequences, they should have neglected to do so.
- (3)
- That the ordinary justice having cognizance of the occurrence should not have proceeded to investigate the facts in order to punish those who might be found guilty; and
- (4)
- If the court, called upon to take cognizance of the affair, should decide it in a sense contrary to existing law and in prejudice of the foreigners concerned.
Do the disorders of the 16th of October appear to be invested, perchance, with any one of these conditions?
Without violating the legal seal of the sumario, I can inform you in advance that neither the wounded sailors, nor the commander of the Baltimore, nor the American consul, nor any person whomsoever has made imputation against our authorities or against their immediate and responsible agents by even insinuating before this court that the disorders of the 16th could have taken place with their participation or knowledge.
[Page 338]Neither has any charge whatever been made, either specific or general, against the said authorities or against the police, because of their not having endeavored to prevent those occurrences and their subsequent and deplorable results.
On the contrary, from the concurrent testimony of the greater part of the sailors of the Baltimore, it appears that the police rendered them timely assistance and that they endeavored to protect them by withdrawing them from the action of the populace and conveying them to their own barracks.
Only one of those sailors, N. C. Janet, maintained before the court that the policeman who arrested him had struck him while taking him to the police barracks, adding at the same time that he did not know that policeman and was unable to prove the fact.
The commander of the Baltimore, himself, who, in company with the North American vice-consul came to make an official visit to the undersigned in the public office of the court, made satisfactory declarations concerning the conduct of the police in the disorders under examination; and added, moreover, that the conduct of certain of the officers toward his sailors had been delicately considerate.
It is incumbent upon me, also, to add for my part, that the court is taking active measures to find all the parties guilty of the injuries committed against the citizens of a friendly nation; and that with the coöperation of the police force, it has succeeded in arresting several of the individuals to whom a direct participation in those acts was attributed, of whom two have confessed.
It is to be regretted that the sumario has not yet been concluded; but you will comprehend that by reason of the great attention given thereto it has not been possible to finish in a few days the investigation of a complicated ease, in which hundreds of persons were involved, many of whom must be called upon to testify, besides which the witnesses must be summoned whom the accused present in their behalf, and their testimony taken.
The sumario will follow the course which our laws of procedure prescribe, and the minister may rest fully assured that exact and impartial justice will be done.
If, therefore, the disorders of the 16th do not involve the first two conditions above set down, if the competent court is conducting the sumario of the case with activity and persistence, and if there be no motive whatever for supposing that in the final judgment to be rendered there will be violation of law to the prejudice of the right of the sailors of the Baltimore, how then has the minister of the United States been enabled to seek in the resort to diplomacy that protection for his countrymen which no one has denied to them, and which the Chilean law most amply concedes to them as to its own citizens?
The undersigned entertains the full assurance that you will uphold with the patriotism, uprightness, and impartiality which characterize you the privileges of this court, if, as I do not anticipate, the minister of the United States should be disposed to disregard them.
May God guard you.
E. Foster Recabarren.
A true copy.
A. Bascuñan M.
The foregoing agrees with the document on file at this legation.