By Perry Duffin
Adriana Rivas appeared as a gentle older woman, caring for the children of Bondi – then Chile accused her of playing a part in a brutal torture chamber in the dark days of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship.
Now the nanny has launched a surprise legal challenge after a decade of denials landed her behind bars, awaiting extradition, with what appeared to be no way out.
Rivas, now 70, was arrested in 2019 at the request of her homeland, which alleged she had participated in the kidnapping of seven people who had vanished in Santiago.
Adriana Rivas is at the centre of a long-running legal battle. Credit:
Court documents provided by Chile during her extradition hearing claim Rivas worked for the secret police which rounded up enemies of Pinochet’s military regime and used sarin gas, electricity and welding torches to torture victims in an empty swimming pool.
Despite Rivas’ denials, she has repeatedly been found eligible for extradition by the courts.
But she was not handed over to Chile, instead remaining in a detention centre for five years.
For the past two years, the federal attorney-general maintained a single-line response to questions about Rivas: “The extradition process involving Ms Rivas is at the final stage, requiring the Australian government to make a determination whether to surrender Ms Rivas to Chile.”
But late last month Rivas filed a new application to the Federal Court suggesting that surrender had finally been ordered.
The application, seen by the Herald, asks the court to “void” the government’s decision to surrender Rivas to Chile.
Rivas’ application also seeks to stop the ministers from taking further steps “directly, or by their agents, officers or delegates, from surrendering Ms Adriana Rivas to the Republic of Chile”.
Former Chilean military ruler and dictator Augusto Pinochet.Credit: Reuters
Dennis Miralis, the solicitor leading the challenge, did not reply to requests for comment.
Rivas had already failed to have her extradition overturned in the Federal Court in 2021. Her legal team had unsuccessfully argued then, and through the lower courts, that her prosecution was “political” in nature.
Chilean documents, released by the lower courts, spell out disturbing allegations that those rounded up by the DINA were interrogated in “dungeons” using electrified metal bunk beds.
The victims were gassed, as part of experiments, and injected with unknown substances before being suffocated and anonymised using a welding torch on the face and hands.
“Then, the bodies were put inside sacks, tied up with cables to a piece of railway beam and then thrown into the ocean by air force helicopters,” a dossier authored by Chilean authorities claimed.
In May 2022 – three years after her arrest – it seemed the final nail was driven into her case after the High Court threw out her challenge. Rivas had failed to tender the necessary documents and effectively “abandoned” her case, the court concluded.
Adriana Rivas with the late general Manuel Contreras, one-time head of Chile's secret police during the Pinochet regime.Credit: ABC News
The nanny arrived in Australia in 1978, just a few years after allegedly joining the DINA intelligence apparatus, and lived an obscure life until Chile began prosecuting the dictator’s former agents.
She was arrested while visiting Chile in 2006 but released on bail and allegedly escaped back to Australia in 2010.
She remained off the radar until 2014, when in an interview with multicultural broadcaster SBS she appeared to justify the use of torture to “break people” – particularly “communists”.
“It was necessary, just as the Nazis used it, and as in the United States, everyone does,” SBS quoted Rivas as saying. “It’s the only way to break people because psychologically there is no method.”
Rivas is alleged to have been involved in the kidnapping of Fernando Ortiz, Fernando Navarro, Lincoyán Berrios, Horacio Cepeda, Héctor Veliz, Reinalda Pereira and Communist Party secretary Víctor Díaz.
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.