Mendoza Durán, César

(d. 1996)

   Chilean general who commanded the Carabineros, the national police force. He was one of four commanders who on 11 September 1973 overthrew the Marxist president Salvador Allende Gossens. The leader of the coup, General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, would later praise Mendoza Durán’s performance, which involved controlling the large cities, particularly the slums, where Allende Gossens had strong support. After the coup, Mendoza Durán and the other three commanders formed the ruling junta, under which the Carabineros played a part in systematically violating human rights. In 1985 14 Carabineros were implicated in the degollados case, in which three members of the then-illegal Partido Comunista de Chile (PC, Communist Party of Chile) were assassinated, and Mendoza Durán was forced to resign from the junta. He died at age 78 on 13 September 1996.

   See also Leigh Guzmán, Gustavo; Merino Castro, José Toribio.