The Concepción Court of Appeals confirmed on Tuesday, October 13, that the state must pay $300 million in compensation for emotional harm to the parents and siblings of Sergio Mardoff Peirano. The young man disappeared in March 2005, and his body remained unidentified at the Legal Medical Service (SML) for more than three years.
According to Emol, citing a statement from the Judiciary, the decision was unanimous and upholds the judgment issued in 2023 by the Second Civil Court of Concepción. The sources do not report the case number.
Mardoff’s skeletal remains were found on April 6, 2015, on Camino a Santa Juana, in Concepción, near a stream. From then on, they remained at the SML as unidentified remains, meaning the remains of a person whose identity was unknown.
The court established that, following that discovery, "no orders were issued and no investigative steps were taken" to establish the identity of the remains. Nor were the necessary forensic examinations performed to determine the cause of death. It was only in 2018 that the remains were confirmed to be those of Sergio Mardoff, while his family was still searching for him.
Justice Carola Rivas Vargas explained that the court awarded compensation for the emotional harm caused by omissions and erroneous and negligent actions by both the Public Prosecutor’s Office (the prosecution service) and the SML.
The lower court’s ruling had established a failure in state service. In simple terms, the court concluded that the public agencies did not function as they should have and that this failure caused harm to the family, which the state must remedy.
The family’s lawyer, Leonel Castro, told BioBioChile that the court confirmed that both institutions had failed in their duty to provide service, as well as the amount of compensation.
Sergio Mardoff, the young man’s father, told the outlet that the ruling confirms the negligence the family had reported from the outset. He added that they were satisfied, although the money does not repair the harm, and asked that such a situation never happen again.
The ruling can still be challenged. Castro considers it likely that the State Defense Council, the body that represents the SML and the Public Prosecutor’s Office in court, will appeal to the Supreme Court. The family hopes it will accept the judgment and not prolong the proceedings.
