SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Chile's national police force has fired an officer convicted of killing a Mapuche activist more than three years ago, a death that has been cited repeatedly by the Indians as evidence that authorities abuse them with impunity.
Interior Minister Andres Chadwick released a statement praising Friday's decision to fire Lt. Walter Ramirez.
Ramirez was convicted of unnecessary violence resulting in the death of Matias Catrileo, a Mapuche Indian who was shot in the back in Araucania in 2008. But he wasn't jailed and remained on the force, a sore point for the Mapuches, whose protests this year on the anniversary of the Catrileo killing set off a fresh wave of violence, including the burning deaths of an elderly couple whose property is near where Catrileo died.
