Chile Burn Victim Says Soldiers Laughed While Torching Her

A young Chilean woman said today that members of a military patrol laughed as they doused her and a companion with gasoline before setting them afire during an anti-government demonstration.

In an interview published today in the weekly magazine Hoy, 18-year-old Carmen Quintana, who is in a hospital recovering from burns to 60% of her body, said she was beaten as she tried to put out the flames.

The other youth, 19-year-old Rodrigo Rojas, a Chilean who resided in the United States, died July 7, five days after the incident.

Their families have filed a $10-million lawsuit against the government of President Augusto Pinochet in a Washington district court.

Quintana said a man with blue eyes and blond hair, who appeared to be the leader of the group, doused her and Rojas with gasoline.

Rojas was lying on the ground beside her, unconscious from blows he had received earlier, she said in the first interview to be published since the incident.

Quintana said she asked of the leader what the soldiers were doing. “He said nothing. They all laughed,” she said.

She said that one of the soldiers then threw an incendiary device on the ground between her and Rojas. As she tried to put out the flames with her hands, she was hit in the mouth with a rifle butt.

A Chilean army lieutenant has been ordered to stand trial by a military court on charges of using unnecessary violence.