---
alias:
- Enrique Lautaro Arancibia Clavel
category: Intelligence & Government
created: 2026-09-21
died: 2011
location: Buenos Aires, Argentina
summary: DINA's Buenos Aires station chief from 1974 to 1978, who prepared the ground
  for Townley's bomb under Carlos Prats's car, received a life sentence in Argentina
  in 2000, and was stabbed to death on parole.
tags:
- Person
- EnriqueArancibiaClavel
- DINA
- OperationCondor
- CarlosPrats
- BuenosAires
- Argentina
updated: 2026-09-21
---

Enrique Lautaro Arancibia Clavel ran the [DINA](/organizations/dina/) station in Buenos Aires from 1974. The Argentine courts found it "debidamente acreditado" that he belonged, from March 1974 until November 24, 1978, to "DINA exterior," an association of at least ten members "whose activity consisted of persecuting the political opponents of the Pinochet regime exiled in Argentina," by kidnapping, torture under interrogation, and the theft of victims' identity papers for reuse. His own function "was to form a parallel network of informants in Buenos Aires to supply data on those being pursued."[^1]

### Prats

In the summer of 1974 Major [Raúl Iturriaga](/people/raúl-iturriaga-neumann/) came to Buenos Aires "with a bag of cash to hire assassins and to coordinate the operation with the Argentine service, SIDE." Arancibia distributed 20,000 dollars to would-be killers who kept the money. [Michael Townley](/people/michael-townley/) then built the bomb himself. After it destroyed the car of General [Carlos Prats](/people/carlos-prats/) and Sofía Cuthbert on September 30, 1974, Townley heard Arancibia shout "Asi mueren los traidores." The court found that he "prepared the ground" for Townley and "viabilizó el desvío de la custodia," the diversion of the general's police guard.[^2][^3]

### Judgment

In November 2000 Tribunal Oral Federal No. 6 of Buenos Aires, Judges María del Carmen Roqueta and José Valentín Martínez Sobrino among its members, sentenced him to reclusión perpetua as "partícipe necesario" in the killings and for membership in an illicit association. It called DINA "an instrument for eliminating opponents" and the "embrión" of [Operación Cóndor](/programs/operation-condor/). An appeals court held the association charge time-barred. On August 24, 2004, on the complaint of the government of [Chile](/places/chile/) as civil party, the Corte Suprema reinstated it, ruling that crimes against humanity were imprescriptible under customary international law when committed. In 2003 he received twelve more years for the kidnapping of two Chilean women. He was paroled in July 2007 and was stabbed fifteen times and killed in 2011 by a young man he had met after his release.[^1][^3]

[^1]: *Arancibia Clavel, Enrique Lautaro s/homicidio calificado y asociación ilícita y otros,* Corte Suprema de Justicia de la Nación, Argentina, August 24, 2004.
[^2]: Dinges, John. *The Condor Years: How Pinochet and His Allies Brought Terrorism to Three Continents*. New Press, 2004, pp. 74-77.
[^3]: "Caso Prats: La DINA fue un instrumento para eliminar opositores," *Diario Judicial,* November 28, 2000. Infobae and La Voz de América retrospectives supply the 2003 sentence, the parole, and the killing.