Juan Manuel Aliste Vega died this Sunday at Santiago Penitentiary Hospital. He was 53 and had terminal cancer with metastases. He was a former member of the Lautaro Movement, a left-wing armed group, and was serving a sentence for the murder of Carabineros Corporal Luis Moyano.
According to BioBioChile, sources familiar with the case confirmed his death at the prison service facility, where Aliste was receiving medical care as his illness progressed. ADN Radio also reported his death based on its own sources.
His death occurred six days after a request for a humanitarian pardon addressed to President José Antonio Kast was submitted to the Ministry of Justice. With that pardon, Aliste hoped to spend his remaining time at home with his wife and children.
The request was not resolved before his death. According to the sources cited by BioBioChile, the process was still at the stage of gathering background information. At that stage, reports are requested from various institutions to assemble the file used to assess the case.
The request had sparked political debate. According to ADN Radio, the Republican Party, Kast's party, publicly supported the possibility of granting the pardon. The sources do not detail the positions taken by other political groups or the government.
The case dates back to October 18, 2007. That day, a robbery at a Banco Security branch in Santiago ended with the death of Corporal Moyano, who had arrived at the scene after being alerted to the robbery.
In 2014, Santiago's Fourth Criminal Trial Court sentenced Aliste to 42 years in prison. The sentence included 18 years for the murder of Moyano, 10 years for the attempted murder of Corporal Fernán Abarca, and other sentences for bank robberies.
The prison service is expected to issue an official statement on the death in the coming hours.
