Avenger | 6. Miriam in Court

Hello, Avenger listeners, It's Steve Fishman and I'm really glad you've tuned in. I hope you love this show as much as we do. A quick word on an upcoming bonus episode. We're doing a bonus with Miriam, the real Miriam. We'll be asking her questions, your questions and getting answers. She'll update us on what's going on in her world and a lot has Please email your questions or thoughts or comments too. Info at Orbitmedia dot fm. Oh And Fisher Stevens can answer your questions too. He's our co

Thanks.

Before we begin, please note that for this story we interviewed Medium and everyone else for dozens of hours in Spanish. We hired actors to voice their words in English. It's nineteen seventy seven, the year that Medium Lewin is kidnapped and imprisoned. Someone else is in a cell too, in a different part of Buenos Aires. Adolfo Peres Esquiel a sculptor, painter, a well known writer and political activist in Argentina. Very few people dared to speak against the military, but Adolfo did.

Circles Jella the y.

He sees this dark mass, the riot and the lights off the Uruguayan coast. He asked the soldiers what they were going to do with him. No one responds by a cal comiosa manipulata. Adolfo sees an official holding a box that usually stored tranquilizers. He thinks of his wife, his kids and praise Ilarisa Givens. Then he says one of the pilots gets a message there's new orders. The plane turns around. According to Adolfo, it was pressured from the Kennedys in the US that explained why he survived

When we approached him, he didn't think twice. He joined the case.

From Orbit Media. I'm Andres caaba Scheedo. This is Avenger the story of Medium Lewin Episode six, The Pilots. It's twenty ten and by now Medium in Jiancadlo's investigation has come a long way.

To be honest, When I joined Giancarlo, I thought it was all going to be a waste of time. I had no faith whatsoever. Seriously, I never thought we would get to where we are now.

Not only have they identified the planes used to carry out the death flights, they had found one that was still flying, a plane with flight logs that dated back to the time of the dictatorship logs with the names of the pilots, and then they managed to air an expose a on national TV. They were excited, even though no one else seemed to care.

The lack of attention from other news outlets was disheartening, but the TV report was never our endgame. When we were deciding how to show the flight logs on TV, we debated whether to blur out the pilot's names or not. My colleagues didn't want to imply their responsibility during the death flights on the spot. I agreed, but for different reasons.

On the TV report, Medium had blurred out the names of the pilots. She sensed that revealing them at the wrong time could ruin her chance of bringing them to just this.

I wanted those names to remain secret until we had a chance of filing a formal judicial claim. If we had aired the names and those pilots or their friends saw it, they would have a chance of fleeing the country. We were getting ready to take what we had gathered to the courts, but we still needed the right person to be the face of this case. I couldn't do it. I was already a witness in other trials, including my own kidnapping. We needed someone else.

They needed someone fearless.

Enrique volunteered drive Away.

Enrique Pinnedo, the actor in Mogul and former airline pilot Jan Carlo admired that larger than life character who always saw himself on a stage. Some saw him as arrogant. He's perfect.

He had the expertise and we knew he wouldn't be afraid to be at the forefront of all of this.

But we needed a second person, and Riquae Pinnedo was an expert pilot and also bold and maybe outlandish. They needed someone serious, someone with gravitas, someone who could speak from experience. Endrique starts floating Adolfo perees Esquiel. After Adolfo's release thirty years earlier, his story gained international attention. It was incredible, moving, horrifying. He survived a death flight and brought back a first hand account. The world couldn't ignore

I had worked with Adolpho before, I knew that having a Nobel Prize winner would be powerful. I called him and explained the case to him, and he said yes.

The first step is to go to the federal Prosecutor's office and make a formal complaint against the pilots, handing over the flight lugs in all of the evidence they've gathered. A judge then as signs of prosecutor to look into the evidence and conduct a thorough investigation, and eventually decides if there's enough evidence for the case. To go to trial.

So there they were, Adolfo Perez, Esquioel and Enrique Pinero going together to ask a judge to investigate the lugs we had found, to see if the planes and their pilots participated in the death flights. Enrique is there as a flight expert and Alotfo as someone who actually survived the death flight. They were a powerful duo. The courts had to act.

In nineteen seventy nine, three years into the dictatorship, the junta has disappeared thousands of people. Medium is still being held captive. The military leaders, meanwhile, are running a public relations offensive. It's aimed at countering the Inner American Commission for Human Rights. They're coming to Argentina in response to

He saw us, the people working in the press office he had built, as his workers. He started trying to figure out ways to let some of us live and work outside of Esma. They told us we were being released.

The challenge for Masida is how to let his workers live and work outside while keeping them under his control.

Yeah, Massa had recently left aesthma, but it wasn't as if his power suddenly vanished. He was a strong man in Argentina, and he still had loyalists inside and outside the Navy. Even though he was no longer a part of, say, the Navy's formal structure, he could still do whatever he wanted.

For most of the time she had been in captivity. Approaching two years, Medium's parents hadn't known her whereabouts. Early in her captivity, she was allowed to phone them, but forced to lie and tell them she was with a fellow activists underground. Then, almost a year after her kidnapping, Medium, as a good prisoner, a seemingly reformed prisoner, was given permission to tell her parents the truth over the phone.

When I told my mom I was in prison, the first thing she said was thank God, because she thought I was better off there than on the streets. She felt I was at least protected. She had no idea. I tried to calm my parents down, tell them I was okay, and before saying bye to them, I'd assure them that one day they would see me again. I

And by the time she disappeared, they knew what the junta was capable of. Her dad knew people who had been disappeared. Medium hadn't told her parents anything about being tortured or about her suspicions that people were being tossed out of planes, so her parents were grateful in a way to whatever forces had kept their daughter alive all this time, to whoever was looking after her while in prison. One day, Medium is allowed to see her parents for

My mother opened the door and she hugged me and started crying. The situation was a little uncomfortable because the armed officer was there the whole time. While my parents and I sat around the table, having tea and pastries. It was horrible. They asked me all sorts of questions in front of him. Are you okay? Are they treating you well? What could I reply in that scenario? Yes, Mom, they treat me okay. I'm okay. Don't worry. I mean, the last thing I wanted was to upset my parents

Then something crazy happens. One day, while Medium is still in captivity, Marceda's right hand man, Jrgueduardo Costa, calls her parents. He invites them to dinner. They meet at a fancy steakhouse. Her parents chose Medium would be there too. A Costa also known as Aldigree the Tiger. He's notorious and terrifies Medium.

He was a complete psychopath. Often he would tell us that every night he had a little chat with a little Jesus who sat on his left shoulder and told him which of us prisoners would go upstairs. Now we knew he was alluding to the death flights.

This guy now wants to meet Medium's parents to tell them the truth about having kidnapped their daughter, to talk about the conditions of her release.

It took them by surprise. But they were willing to meet him. They didn't know I was living in a concentration camp and people were being killed.

Medium was wearing a blouse with a blazer and a bell jacket she had borrowed from fellow prisoners. A guard waited outside the restaurant for her.

When I got there, Acosta hadn't arrived yet. My parents were already there. They were nervous because they knew he was some sort of big boss.

Medium's parents apparently saw it as a celebratory dinner. They show up to the restaurant with a gift for Acosta, a nice bottle of scotch. She was regal. Medium can't believe how surreal it is.

I had never told my parents about the horrors I had lived through, about the torture, So there I am watching them thanking my captor. Imagine they thought he had saved their daughter's life.

When Acosta arrives, Medium notices her parents a bit tense, with fake smiles on their faces. They wanted a Coosta to know that they would make sure their daughter didn't return to political activism. Acosta orders himself a thick, juicy steak in a bottle of wine. He did most of the talking that night.

Agosta tells my parents that I had been reformed, that I was very intelligent, that I had a bright future, and that now I was ready to be reintegrated into society. Then he tells my parents he needs them to rent me a specific apartment to keep me safe, that I was in danger of being targeted, being seen as a trader for working with the military. It was a huge financial commitment for my parents, but they wanted to see me so badly that they agreed to rent me the apartment.

At last, Medium is released from prison from esthma, but they're not really letting her go.

They wanted us to think they released us because we were finally reformed, but in reality, we were stuck working. They forced me to work in different places. Some days I was assigned to the Ministry of Welfare. Other days I was in Admiral Mascera's office to work on a new publication he created.

In the months that follow Medium keeps a low profile to avoid upsetting her captors, but she does manage to meet up with fellow activists at times, even though it was extremely risky.

We met in secret. It was scary because they could be watching us but we needed to feel like we were doing normal things, like other normal young people. Sometimes we'd meet at one of our houses, we'd go out to the movies or to eat pizza. Only we understood one another. We had lived through similar horrors.

And on one occasion there were consequences.

I had met with a comrade who had also survived and got in permission to leave the country. It was forbidden to meet other prisoners, but somehow got to Acosta that we had met that night, so I was told he wanted to see me.

She was taken back to Esma.

He kept me waiting for three hours. I thought he was going to kill me.

Instead, a Costa arrived with a little velvet box. In it was a silver bracelet. He told her he chose it especially for her.

I think what he wanted to convey was I have the power to kill you right here, right now, or I could save you if I trust you. I was in shock. I had to wear that bracelet everywhere.

Medium by now knows how to play her role. She thinks a Costa for his thoughtfulness. She's learned to control her emotions in front of officials, and Medium continues to go to those meetings she grows close to a prisoner she had met inside Esthma, who, like her, is on this work release program.

Carlos. He was a kind, warm, genuine person. That night I first arrived at the clandestine Center, he had brought me some ice cream, told me to stay calm. He was in the maintenance group inside Esthma, but his real value was that he had experience in graphic design. He knew how to use the printing press, so now and then they forced him to make false ideas for the intelligence agents. Carlos and I had lived through a lot. They had captured him the same year as me, also

This wasn't the same exuberant love she had once had with one her activist comrade and secret husband, but she decided to have the baby first.

I wasn't in love, but I felt that I could trust Carlos. He was a good man. I knew he was going to be a good father. Then I fell in love with him.

The pregnancy was unexpected, but at least it allowed her to work at just one place.

They let me choose what type of forced labor I preferred. I chose the Ministry of Welfare because it was the farthest from Masea in terms of location, though we were still working for Masea himself. But if I failed to arrive home on time, they'd knock on my apartment door and ask me what was wrong. They reminded me that my family was also being watched. Not obeying would put their lives in danger.

And every once in a while, as part of her surveillance, there were surprise visits.

One day as Tis shows up at my door.

Alfredo Astis a naval officer in the Junta. Medium knew him from captivity. He was always around. He worked under the supervision Veltira Costa, the guy who took Medium and her parents to that fancy dinner. One of Astis's jobs was to infiltrate a human rights group. He gathered information on activities and whereabouts. He helped set up a raid. The activists were kidnapped and taken to prison.

It was very easy for him to do that because Astise had a face that looked like an angel's. His peers back at ZMA actually called him a lang Hill Rubio, the blonde angel.

That day, Astis knocks on Medium's doore.

He takes me to his car and drives us to this bar and tells me he's leaving the country. He's off to help South Africa's government and that if I needed anything, I could reach out to him through his parents. He then took a napkin and scribbled down their phone number save that napkin.

The tortures seem to believe that they're the protectors of people like Medium and are appreciated for it. Astes's openness to share his parents' names, their phone numbers, his assumption that Medium would want to stay in touch with him. It's a big mistake, an amateurish mistake made by a respected commander who was traveling to South Africa to help that government eliminate resistance to apartheid.

They had so much power that in their minds they were convinced that we were reformed, that we were on their side now as allies not enemies.

That Napkin will later become an important piece of evidence in the case linking asties to the junta's atrocities.

A year after Adolfo and Enrique present their evidence, their formal complaint to a judge. Things feel like they're moving in slow motion.

There's no action, but evidence is accumulating. By twenty eleven, more and more cases against former Junta leaders emerge. A judge decides to include the case against the Pilots. The accusations Alolfo and Enrique had made based on medium and gian Carlo's investigation to the biggest trial in Argentina's history. The outside world starts paying attention, especially in Italy. Gian Carlos homeland.

In Italy, one newspaper devoted five pages to the court proceedings and our findings. Dey cited proudly that an Italian photographer had been part of the investigation.

Gian Carlos a good Snigoa the chest of the de Dicartio, Pimeno and Argentina.

This coincides with gen Carlo moving back to Rome.

In Argentina, there's zero press about the investigation.

The media was still sleeping on the story.

But Medium is determined more than ever to see justice done, so she turns her energy to the judicial fight. Giancarlo, though, has moved on.

Giancarlo's passion for covering what was happening in the present began to fade. He's more focused on photographing the past, not what's still unfolding. Once he fulfilled his obsession of finding the planes, a new one kicked in, shadowing the forensic team who are trying to identify bodies remains that were being found in unmarked graves.

Meanwhile, Medium keeps working at Canal Trece. She's got other assignments, but she won't let the investigation into the death Lights drop. She tries to follow up on her own reporting, and there's a break in the story. It's due to a simple but radical request. This request came from the desk of a prosecutor. It was straightforward, really, He just asked for what he wanted. He made a formal request to

It was brilliant, and because I was one of the few reporters working on the case, he asked me to come to his office and tells me that every single division of the military had responded positively to their request except the Navy, the ones in charge of ESMA. They said they have the right to destroy these types of documents.

After three years, the.

Navy still had many pro Hunta loyals in its ranks. They were eager to destroy documents that might reveal their illegal operations. These included, of course, all their flight lugs from the years when they were throwing people to their deaths.

It was a blow. The only thing I could do was just confront the admiral in charge for a TV report and have him on record explaining why they had destroyed these documents. And we did just that. He just gave us platitudes about bureaucracy. It felt like a dead end, So what followed was quite unexpected.

The office of the judge leading the proceedings suddenly receives two thousand, seven hundred and fifty eight flight lugs from nineteen seventy six. In nineteen seventy seven, they're handed over by the Argentine Naval Prefecture.

And this was a full one to eighty from zero lugs to a potential treasure.

The prefecture, a separate entity from the navy, had undergone a complete change. The people who took over came from the civil service. Unlike their navy counterparts, they were determined to preserve the documents. They knew their historical value and how they could help future investigations. Within those documents are the thousands of logs for most of the planes that were used, including the sky Van that was in Florida, the one medium and Giancarlo found these logs.

Were even more detailed than the technical logs we had found in Florida. This was incredible, a one and a million chance.

The prosecutor now assigns a special government unit to investigate crimes against humanity, and then includes the Argentine Forensic Anthropology team, the group that jian Caadlo's shadowing, headed by Carlos macOS Omiliana.

So these new.

Logs, they actually hand them over to Maco to sort through an analyze, and in those records, Michael finds a surprising connection to the planes and the pilots.

In the next episode.

We've identified very few people who died in the death flights, about one percent of them. It's extremely rare, But in this case, what's also extremely rare is to have such detailed, well preserved flight.

Logs from Orbit Media.

This is Avenger, the Stone of Medium Lewin I'm your host and senior producer Andrescavacchedo. The series was produced by Seguiel Rodrie Sandino and edited by Monica Campbell. Original score Nicolas Paschella, mixing and mastering Christopher Hoff and Austin Smith. Assistant producers Andres Feschtenholz and Eleana Gillespi. FactCheck Alejandro Marinelli and leonardos Canoni. Legal review Neil Rossini, Casting director Paula

A quick word about subscriptions. If you love that, listen on. If you're not so keen on ads, sign up for True Crime Clubhouse on Apple Podcasts no ads and also bingeability. You can hear the entire Avenger series all at once. It's just two ninety nine a month.