On a hot summer afternoon, on January 13, businessman Jonás Gómez went to dinner with his friend Ignacio Pérez Walker at the César restaurant located right on the beach in the Zapallar resort, in the north of the Valparaíso Region.
After eating and paying the bill, and while they were leaving the premises, Pérez Walker approached one of the adjoining tables to greet a person who turned out to be the former Justice Minister of the first government of President Sebastián Piñera, Felipe Bulnes (RN). , and that he was accompanied by a middle-aged man whose identity is unknown.
After greeting him, Pérez Walker introduced Gómez, despite the fact that they both knew each other very well. So far, all good. However, according to the complaint filed by the businessman, Bulnes raised his voice saying rudely: “I don’t greet this hueón.” Gómez, according to his defense, without losing his temper, told him that there was nothing to regret about it, because he “did not deal with bandits.”
Given this, the lawyer and National Renovation (RN) militant would have lost control, pounced on Jonás Gómez and gave him an attack of such magnitude that he fell on the beach itself, which is at least one and a half meters below the surface. runway.
It is worth mentioning that Jonás Gómez is about to turn 70, while Bulnes was born 53 years ago.
“Although Don Jonás fractured his hand in that act, he tried to get up quickly. However, when he went up to the terrace from which he was thrown, he was attacked by the second member of the table, who knocked him down and punched him several times in the the face and the head”, relates the judicial action.
After these attacks, Gómez left the place together with Ignacio Pérez. “There had been a commotion at the scene, for which reason he considered it unnecessary to deepen the embarrassing scandal generated by the aggressors,” the complaint adds, which can be evidenced in the following security camera record:
As he walked away with Pérez, according to his lawyers, Gómez realized that the middle finger of his right hand was dislocated and twisted to one side, managing to adjust it with the help of his companion. After that, and still shocked, he went to his home.
The following day, they affirm that Jonás Gómez woke up “bruised” and with pain typical of a fracture in his right hand, for which he consulted a doctor who instructed him to take an X-ray to make an accurate diagnosis. Prior to said examination, of course, the commercial engineer had gone to the Zapallar Police Station to file the complaint and verify the usual injuries.
Subsequently, following the advice of his doctor, Gómez went to the headquarters of the Clínica Alemana in Maitencillo where an X-ray was taken and he was diagnosed by two different doctors —one a specialist in traumatology— with a dislocation and fracture “of the distal phalanx, avulsive with displacement” of the middle finger of the right hand. The doctors also certified the injuries he suffered to his face and head, leaving him with a bruise on his eye.
The diagnosis, along with other documents on Jonás Gómez’s state of health, are attached to the complaint. The hand fracture is a serious injury, indicating a recovery of more than 30 days.
Gómez’s defense emphasizes that his client, without physically assaulting any of those present, was attacked and beaten by Felipe Bulnes and his companion, who caused him, among other injuries, a fracture of the middle finger of his right hand.
Finally, they show numerous messages sent by Felipe Bulnes to Jonás Gómez the day after the altercation to offer his excuses.
The version of Felipe Bulnes
Felipe Bulnes broke the silence and assured that this situation has him very upset, “because they make me look like a violent person, when the only aggressive person with a history of violence is this Mr. Gómez,” he said.
“Jonás Gómez is not unknown. I defended his family against him due to a family conflict in business management,” recalled Bulnes, in an interview with La Segunda.
The former minister assured the aforementioned outlet that it was Gómez Pacheco “who approaches my table and begins to insult me.”
“I see that he is coming towards me to hit me, to which I stop and push him away with my arms. He stumbles, falls and then tries to hit me again to which the local people reduce him,” said Bulnes. And he pointed out: “He has a history of violence beating his brother and nephew. This is real, since for this reason a court sentenced him to take impulsive driving classes.”
Finally, Felipe Bulnes remarked that “in my life I have never had an episode of violence and I have always been correct.”
the lawsuit
After the events described, before the Guarantee Court of La Ligua, the commercial engineer Jonás Gómez Pacheco filed a criminal complaint against the former minister, and against all those responsible for the crime of serious injuries, and any other crime that It can be configured based on the facts described and those revealed by the investigation carried out by the Public Ministry.
Gómez Pacheco, represented by the lawyers Miguel Schürmann and Alejandro Awad, requests that the complaint be declared admissible and forwarded to the Prosecutor’s Office, “so that the prosecuting entity develops an investigation aimed at proving the commission of the facts that are the subject of the same, the criminal responsibility of the defendants, requesting that the investigation be formalized in their regard, that they be accused and that the sentence to the penalties established by law be obtained in the corresponding oral trial, with an express sentence of costs”.
According to the complaint filed against Bulnes, everything is contextualized in a series of conflicts between the Gómez Pacheco brothers: Jonás, on the one hand, and Segundo, Teresa and Magdalena, on the other. And it is that a series of personal conflicts between the brothers gave rise to a division of the Gómez Pacheco business group into two blocks. Thus, the legal team of the second group of brothers was led by Felipe Bulnes.
Up to the date of the facts denounced in the complaint, they affirm that Bulnes had only fought legally, since both family groups filed a series of crossed legal actions over time, both civil and criminal. However, Gómez’s lawyers add, “Mr. Bulnes’ approaches to our client were often unpleasant and confrontational.”
They maintain, “there are plenty of witnesses to the defendant’s insults and threats against Jonás Gómez, which usually took place in board meetings, and which probably arose from the frustration of the legal strategies of the defendant Bulnes in this family conflict,” where “they never physical violence had been used.
In this context, Gómez filed a criminal complaint in 2021 against the defendant for the crimes of unfair administration and incompatible negotiation. But the criminal procedure to which said complaint gave rise, after a little over a year of processing, would end by an agreement between the parties.
On the other hand, at the end of 2021, the defendant Bulnes was replaced as legal advisor by the brothers of Jonás Gómez, who hired other specialists.
After that, there were no interactions between Jonás Gómez and Felipe Bulnes, but the facts recounted in the complaint show that Bulnes —according to the defense of the businessman and son of former Radical Party (PR) senator Jonás Gómez Gallo— “ He kept intact for all this time the resentment and animosity that he had incubated towards Don Jonás”.
“More than a year after leaving his role as legal adviser to the counterpart of our client, and several months after the criminal case against him ended, the lawyer, for little more than a few words exchanged on the seashore, he would unleash, this time physically, his wrath on the brother of his former clients, violently attacking him to the point of causing serious injury,” the complaint states.
legal support
The complaint specifies that the crime of serious injuries is provided for and punished in the Penal Code, with sentences of imprisonment in its minimum and medium degree.
It should be borne in mind that bodily injuries are classified between serious injuries (articles 397 and 398) which in turn are divided into very serious (article 397 number one) and simply serious (article 397 number two); less serious injuries (article 399) and finally as a misdemeanor, minor injuries (article 494 number five). The defense of Gómez Pacheco accuses that the facts narrated are constitutive of the crime of serious injuries.
Along with the complaint, they also request that a broad investigation order be issued to the Criminal Investigation Brigade of La Ligua, that Felipe Bulnes Serrano be summoned to testify as the accused, that the victim be summoned to testify , Ignacio Pérez Walker is located and summoned to testify, the Legal Medical Service is ordered to prepare an expert report to determine the seriousness of the injuries suffered, and the local “César” is requested to send the list of the workers who were on the shift on Monday, February 13, 2023.
Complaint against Felipe Bulnes by The counter on Scribd