The Pinochet Precedent: Who Could be Arrested Next?
Interviews by Marguerite Feitlowitz

Human rights experts roundly agree that Augusto Pinochet's 1998 arrest in London has made for a "new moment," a "turning point," "a whole new calculus for transnational justice." Yet the climate remains volatile, marked by unprecedented legal advances as well as dramatic setbacks.

One landmark case embraces both extremes. In February 2000, Chad's former tyrant, Hissein Habre, was arrested in Senegal where, since his ouster, he has been living in exile. A direct consequence of the Pinochet precedent, this was the first time that an African leader was charged with human rights abuses by the court of another African nation. Moreover, the case was brought by victims — survivors of torture, death squads, and terror — who traveled to Dakar in order to testify in court. Hailed by African human rights groups as "the most important [court] case in Senegal's history," the arrest was later overturned by another court, and the judges involved in the earlier decision were fired.

In August 2000, two Argentine "Dirty Warriors" were arrested while traveling abroad. Ricardo Miguel Cavallo was detained in Mexico on August 24 after Baltasar Garzon, the same Spanish judge who initiated the prosecution of Pinochet, issued an extradition request on charges of torture, murder, and participation in genocide. The former naval officer was known as "Serpico" (for his resemblance to Al Pacino) when he worked at the Navy Mechanics School--often called the "Argentine Auschwitz" or the "Harvard of Death" — where he was famous both for executing and teaching the art of torture. France too has called for Cavallo's extradition, in connection with the torture and deaths in the Navy Mechanics School of fifteen French nationals, including two nuns, Alice Domon and Leonie Duquet. Mexico is expected to comply with these requests for extradition, a process that should take about eighteen months.