Seven shots were heard from Plaza Yungay. It was early morning and the noise woke up the residents of a building located a few blocks away, who alerted them to the shooting through an internal WhatsApp group. The next day, a man was found dead and with seven shots in his body, in the middle of Cautín street.
No one denies the acts of violence that have occurred in the northwestern sector of the commune and city of Santiago, especially those that occurred in the vicinity of the Yungay neighborhood, where the residence of President Gabriel Boric —a neighbor since last year— is located. However, contrary to various headlines in the local press, not all of these criminal acts have taken place within the historic limits of the “Bello Barrio.”
The crimes have even attracted the attention of the international press. “Record of homicides in Yungay, the neighborhood where President Boric lives in Santiago”, headlined the Spanish newspaper El País in March 2022. In fact, according to the Spanish media, the owner of the house that President Boric chose for live, he rented it out precisely because he felt insecure.
The issue is that some national media have insisted on headlining their police cut notes emphasizing the proximity to the presidential residence, something that does not leave indifferent the residents of the sector described by the poet Mauricio Redolés as “a beautiful neighborhood of old lights and kind people.”
24 hours headlines: “They find a body with 7 bullets inside a city in the Yungay neighborhood”
Emol headlines: New act of violence in the Yungay neighborhood: Subject was shot and is at risk of life
A historical fact. On April 5, 1839, President José Joaquín Prieto issued the founding decree of the neighborhood that honors the triumph of Chile in the battle of Yungay, in which the streets Alameda, Matucana, Avenida San Pablo (in then the road to Valparaíso) and Brazil (ex Cañada de Diego García de Cáceres or Acequia de Negrete), on the lands that belonged to the late Diego Portales.
If the historical limits of the Yungay neighborhood are considered, the intersections of Cautín Street with San Pablo Avenue and that of Maipú with Balmaceda that are indicated in publications by Emol and 24 hours, would definitely be outside the perimeter. The same would happen with the so-called “narco fortress” denounced by Channel 13 in January, located on the northern side of San Pablo, although the outlet only specified that it was “a few blocks” from President Boric’s house.
These streets would be even further away, if one considers the declaration of National Monument in the category Typical Zone of the Yungay Neighborhood (2008), known and supported by the Illustrious Municipality of Santiago and the Executive Secretariat of the National Monuments Council. This identifies that the northernmost limit of the neighborhood is Rosas street. That is, one street before San Pablo.
The only delimitation that I would leave within the Yungay neighborhood, although only one of the three acts of violence described by the press —the one that occurred in Cautín street—, would be the one established in the Communal Diagnosis of Public Security prepared by the Municipality of Santiago and the Undersecretary for Crime Prevention in 2017. This maintains that the northern limit of the neighborhood is Mapocho street.
Limits of the Yungay neighborhood, according to a diagnosis of authorities in 2017.
On the contrary, a search in Google Maps delimits the Yungay neighborhood in an even smaller perimeter. The blue circle corresponds to the site of the event reported by Emol and the red one indicated by 24 hours.
José Osorio, president of the Chilean Association of Neighborhoods and Heritage Areas and director of the Yungay Neighborhood Council, considers that this situation is due both to the commotion caused by the arrival of the neighboring President, and to the lack of clarity regarding the limits from the same neighborhood.
“As it is fashionable, with the arrival of the President, and since there is no spirit of being clear about the true territory, it is generalized,” explains Osorio. Sometimes, he says, it is even considered that the Yungay neighborhood reaches the Parque de los Reyes —which has recently been closed with bars on its perimeter—, but he affirms that several of the acts of violence that appear in some media take place on the outer limit , “outside the historical limits of Barrio Yungay”.
“There is a stigmatization that is being generated by the neighborhood. We feel it as a political issue to make a kind of attack on the President who lives in the neighborhood, but strictly speaking, everything that is the north side of San Pablo, from there towards the north, does not correspond to the historical limits of the neighborhood”, says the also adviser of the Council of Monuments.
“Pepe” Osorio —as he is known in the neighborhood—, although he acknowledges that indeed there are events that take place a few steps from the presidential residence, he remembers that before they talked about streets more than about neighborhoods. And he adds: “Not exempt from the fact that eventually there are things that happen within this historic polygon, it does not happen at the level of what has been talked about in the press in recent months.”
“There is a stigmatization,” he remarks, without minimizing the fact that “there are problems to be addressed in terms of security,” particularly in the commune of Santiago, but also —he warns— “you have to be rigorous about the territory in which these events occur facts”.
“From 2013 we are holding demonstrations, handing out letters, projects, but none of the communal governments believe that they have had an efficient security policy, from Carolina Tohá to Felipe Alessandri and now with Irací (Hassler),” the neighborhood leader lashes out. And it is that José Osorio has been behind the defense of the neighborhood for more than 10 years, when he began a series of demonstrations with calls for attention to all the authorities. However, he notes, “none have stepped up to address this seriously and systematically.”
According to data from the Carabineros, in the commune of Santiago, between January 1 and November 27, 2022, 49 murders occurred, well above the 20 in the same period of 2021. In addition, in crimes such as robberies with violence, it was reported an increase from 5,056 to 9,872 in the capital.
Mayor Irací Hassler (PC) addressed the issue in December of last year, when she warned that it is a worrying situation and that “more state presence” is necessary in the capital’s neighborhoods. “Particularly, the homicide rate causes us a lot of concern and we especially see that it is necessary to address this work in the Yungay neighborhood, the Franklin neighborhood and also in the historic center, and it is what we have raised with the Ministry of the Interior, because unfortunately there are places where organization is generated behind,” the community chief pointed out, on that occasion.
Mayor Hassler indicated that they are working together with both police forces to combat these crimes and that, in addition, they have denounced as a municipality the presence of 70 houses seized where crimes are committed, for which they expect prompt actions by the Public Ministry.
From the Government, the last statement was made by the Undersecretary for Crime Prevention, Eduardo Vergara, who stated that it has been determined “to continue reinforcing something that we had been reinforcing particularly in the commune of Santiago, beyond a particular neighborhood”, together with regret that homicides have been on the rise in the commune for some years now.
“We are taking actions to redouble actions, particularly in that neighborhood (Yungay),” said Undersecretary Vergara, while specifying that the rise in homicides has been manifesting at least since 2016-2017 with a sustained rise. For this reason, “we celebrate the decision of the Public Prosecutor’s Office to take a turn and reinforce action on crimes committed by organizations, particularly homicides,” he stressed, in addition to ensuring that with the new national prosecutor, Ángel Valencia, they seek to reinforce “the agreement that We signed a few months ago to give birth to the National Center for the Prevention of Violent Crimes in the Undersecretary for Crime Prevention, because precisely in cases like those of the Yungay neighborhood, what we cannot do is keep only the figures. on the table the investigation of the context”.
José Osorio appreciates that there is police intervention in different parts of Santiago, although he expresses that they are still waiting for the appointment of a prosecutor dedicated exclusively to the issue “that will remain as long as necessary, to generate solutions and that the community itself feels that it is It’s moving forward and not going back, which is what we’ve seen since 2013.”
real estate speculation
Councilwoman Rosario Carvajal, who together with the neighborhood leaders José Osorio, Marcelo Arancibia and the current senator Claudia Pascual (PC), represented the Yungay Neighborhood Defense Group in 2008 in the aforementioned request for declaration of a National Monument, states: “it calls attention that sectors that are rather far from the founding center of Barrio Yungay, are now considered by the press as part of it”. She also, she believes that there is an intention to link it to the residence of President Boric.
According to Carvajal, especially in the Martínez de Rosas sector, it is something that has been going on for at least eight years, with complicated situations such as traffic lights, shootouts and fights. In addition, he adds, “it is linked to other facts of real estate speculation.”
“Many of these sectors have been bought by real estate developers who are not responsible. Those houses are taken and from those sectors and houses they advance towards the block and the block.” Thus, for the councilor, she also calls attention to the fact that, despite such serious events, “there is still no plan as we have requested, for example, with an exclusive prosecutor.”
The mayor —known as the councilwoman who defeated Lollapalooza, after promoting the efforts to remove the festival from O’Higgins Park—, acknowledges that although there have been investigations and raids, in the Yungay neighborhood, these “overflow” situations persist, reiterating the link with the real estate sector.
“By not taking responsibility for the owners, this feeling of insecurity is generated that is increasing. And pressure is also generated before the neighbors. If the insecurity is overwhelmed, the historical neighbors begin to migrate and that is very worrying, “he argues Carvajal. Likewise, it stands out, in the sector is the layout of Line 7 of the Metro and some fires have also been registered.
According to the councilor for Santiago, “different interests and urban dynamics of real estate speculation are operating.” And, faced with this “abandonment”, she assures her, “there is a political interest in linking acts of violence, which predate the arrival of President Boric, with the location of his residence in the neighborhood.”
