The Bug Spray Man Asked
Chileans mark the 50th anniversary of the coup d’etat. The sign reads “I have faith in Chile and its destiny.”
It was the “bug spray” man.
Almost fifty-two years later, that says it all.
The bug spray man?
On Thursday, September 20, 1973, he was “spraying for bugs” at 7740 – our family home (Mrs. Flynn insisted it was “preventional.”) – when Father Thomas Kirchmyer, Superior General of the Maryknoll (Missioner) Fathers and Brothers, called to tell her I was a political prisoner in the already infamous Estadio Nacional – national futbol (soccer) stadium in Chile.
Until their deaths, neither Daddy (1998) nor my mother (2021) ever asked or wanted to hear about my experience.
Two weeks after my October 1 return to the States, Maryknoll sent me home for a little R&R. One afternoon, the “Orkin man” returned and asked Mrs. Flynn “What happened?” She replied, “I don’t know. We haven’t talked about it. You can ask him, if you want.”
He did.
Mrs. Flynn went to the opposite end of the house.
Soldiers aiming at La Moneda – the presidential palace, September 11, 1973
Father Tobin has urged me “Write about it.” Recently, the Maryknoll Brother imprisoned with me discovered a November 16, 1973 affidavit he produced – six weeks after our return to the States – and submitted to our Maryknoll superiors.
Here’s more of the story, based on his affidavit and my memories. Except where otherwise indicated, quotations are from the affidavit. As noted previously, we self-identified as “priests” because our interrogators and their superiors didn’t understand the concepts of an American seminarian doing missionary work as part of his training for priesthood or a religious Brother.
Late Sunday night (September 16)/Monday morning, the Brother and I were confined to a stadium locker room - by memory about 25 by 45 feet, the size of a high school football locker room. That night there were 70 men – ranging in age from high school or early college age into their sixties or older.
“The beatings on both sides of our cell lasted from approximately midnight to 1:30 AM.
“Present in our cell was an Argentinian who had been taken into custody by the carabineros (police). His glass eye had been removed by them and they had poured salt into the opening. When he took off his shirt to wash I saw the marks of the beating he had received on his back and chest…
“At noon time [Monday, September 17] the number of detainees in our cell had increased from seventy to one hundred and fifty-three. The majority were Brazilian. The next largest number were Uruguayans.
“People from twenty-five different countries were present in our cell.
“A Peruvian carrying a diplomatic passport was in our cell. Ke (sic) told u.a (sic) the Chilean authorities had refused to recognize it.
“Foreigners told us of hearing an announcement over the radio and TV that all foreigners, even if their passports were in order, had to present themselves to the authorities in the Unctad Building. Many did so and were transported to the National Stadium”.
Bombing La Moneda
On Tuesday
“The Brazålåans (sic) present in our cell, as well as the Üruguayans (sic), were terrified of being expelled back to their countries. Both felt that they wovld (sic) be immediately taken into custody and jailed in their home countries for being extremists.
“The Brazilians and Uruguayans began talk of a hunger strike. This was dismissed as the detainees felt we were already on a hunger strike. At approx— mately (sic) ten AM we were given a cup of warm milk with sugar added and a piece of bread. In the afternoon at approximately three or three-thirty PM we were ri.ven e( sic) half a bowl of beans and cooked strands of spaghet•ti. (sic). We were not fed in the evening...”
I lost 15+ pounds in eleven days. I do not recommend the cuisine.
“On the afternoon of this day the 153 of us were taken into the hallway and made to form a circle. Military officiers (sic) led a masked man who looked at each of us for a few seconds. When he had finished looking at all of us he pointed to a Japanese youth. This youth was then led away by the military officiers (sic). He later was allowed to return to our cell to pick up his belongings but was not allowed to talk with us.
I had spoken to this Japanese youth earlier. He told me he had entered
Chile on a 90 day visa, the visa was close to expiring so he had gone over to
Argentina, stayed there a few days, obtained another visa and re-entered Chile.
I clearly remember the terror instilled by the masked man. More importantly, for more than fifty years, whenever I have said we were held in a locker room with 153 men, my brain (conscience?) has tortured me with a doubt that there couldn’t possibly be 153. Reading the affidavit for the first time in June 2025, brought an indescribable sense of relief and horror. It was true!
At one point – I no longer remember what day but while we were in this locker room, I heard an officer screaming at the young soldiers “guarding” us that we were “extremely dangerous foreign extremists” who had “come to Chile to kill Chilenos.”
Foreign extremists?!?!?!?
The Brother was planning to teach Architecture at the Catholic University; I was teaching in the parish grade school, attending classes at the graduate School of Theology of the Catholic University and planning to start an AA group. The other foreign priests were teachers, pastors and servants of the People of God. The locker room was filled with journalists, tourists – a Canadian and a New Zealander, college students and folks swept off the streets
“Conditions in the over-crowded cell had become unbearable. We only had two blankets for every three people. We sleep in turns of 3 to hours on the floor.
This was probably the “photo op” day – the only day we saw the sun.
Again, I’ve harbored a deep doubt that it could not have been only “three hours” on the floor. I’m so grateful for that sentence. I still recall waking - after being forced to sleep on my left side with my head on the leg of the Canadian or the New Zealander, friends who were going to trek around the world. Chile was their first stop; they were arrested because their passport was not in order.
Fifty-two years later I can only sleep on my left side. At home or traveling, I still need three or four blankets.
A significant number of the 153 in our cell were young and/or sick. We “slept” 51 laying down on the concrete floor and 102 standing.
That afternoon a Dutch priest of the Congregation of the Sacred Heart and I raised a ruckus. As a result, a guard located an officer who was willing to speak with us. We let loose. Straight-facedly bullshooting in Mother Superior-stern language; we threatened a hunger strike and promised to accuse him before the United Nations and the world of violations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In machinegun-like fashion, we adlibbed but it worked:
“This particular evening 22 of us volunteered to sleep out under the cement supports for the stands in the hallway area.”
In fact, that night, on the dirt below the stadium grandstands, the Argentinian with the glass eye and I shared a blanket over us and a blanket under us. He described to me how his glass eye had been removed, salt poured in his wound and the eye forced back in the socket. Throughout the night he repeated “I’ll never live to see my wife and children again.”
That day, Father Juan Alcina, a Spanish priest of the Catholic Action Workers Movement, was arrested. Cardinal Raul Silva Henriquez was notified of his arrest but was unable to locate him. His body was found days later in the Mapocho River and identified by a representative of the Spanish consulate. He had ten bullet wounds in his back.
Protesters against the military dictatorship, September 1985
Wednesday, September 19:
“People in our cell told of the beatings they had received. [It] was cczz:on (sic) [common] knowledge that anyone detained [in] a carabinero comisaria [police station] received a beating from the carabineros [police officers].It was also common knowledge that anyone detained by Air Force personnel also received beatings.
“Three Dutch priests of the Sacred Heart Fathers told of being tra.nsported (sic) to the Stadium in a bus from a comisaria [police station]. They were made to lie face down on the floor of the bus, with other detainees, and carabineros walked over them and beat them with rifle butts.
“The names of these Dutch priests were: (1) Corelio, who was the Superior of the Sacred Heart Fathers from Holland, (2) Alejandro, who was detained by carabineros while watching the Chilean Air Force rocket and bomb the FEÄTTcommunity) [sic] of La Victoria and, (3) Martin, who was detaized [sic] by carabineros who came to his rectory
“The 153 of us were taken out this Wednesday morning to the outside soccer field. This was the only time I was allowed out to receive the sun and air.”
We later leared this was a “photo op” for the international press. Photos of some of stadium’s prisoners were flashed around the world as the new military junta tried to prove the lie that prisoners were being treated humanely.
“After being seated in the outside stands for approximately one hour I was transferred to another cell, which was outside of the Stadium but connected to the Stadium by a stairwell on the second floor, along with Francis Flynn, [Dutch priests] Corelio, Alejandro, Martin and Julian, a priest from Luxemborg”.
It is my recollection that this was a ticket booth.
“In the cell to which we were taken were a Chilean youth and two Germans. The Germans had been living in the Towers of San Borja, an apartment house, Carabineros had entered their apartment at IAM and severely beat one of them on the back. He was in pain and it was thought he suffered kidney damage…”
The “Chilean youth” was a payaso – clown; the Germans has made their own chess board with pieces carved from orange peels; when the Germans weren’t looking, he delighted in stealing and swallowing the pieces.
Pope John Paul II passes anti-Pinochet protesters on April 3, 1987, in Santiago.
Thursday, September 20:
“I awoke to the sound of machine gun fire coming from the far end of the Stadium at 4 AM. The machi.ne (sic) gun fire lasted 10 to 15 minutes after which I heard the sound of pistol shots. Then the machine gun fire began once again for approximately 10 - 15 minutes followed by pistol shots. This pattern continued until 5 AM when it stopped.
“The distance between the Stadium and the outside wall was approximately 500 yards. nae (sic) machine gun fire and pistol shots came from outside of the Stadium itself but within the adjoining walls.
“I guessed that people were being executed and that those who had not died were being the coup de grace. I dismissed the idea of an attack on the Stadium as it was heavily guarded.
“When I awoke in the morning Francis Flynn told me he had heard the machine gun and pistol fire and that he had hypothesized that people were being executed at the time he had heard it. I had not told him that I had either heard it or that my hypothesis was identical to his.
“None of the other seven detainees mentioned that they had heard this machine gun fire and pistol fire and we did not ask them.
“The previous afternoon, a subsecretary from their embassy visited the Dutch priests. He returned this afternoon and reported that, as we requested, he had called the American Consulate and informed them of our situation. He returned this afternoon to say that a representative of the American Consulate had called to thank him for the information. One of the Dutch priests was release and left with the subsecretary; the other two Dutch priests remained locked up with us.”
That afternoon, the Brother was interrogated again. I don’t recall a similar interrogation.
“…while continuing to look directly at me. After thirty seconds or so he [the interrogator] said, ‘You are a priest. You’re a leftist and you're obviously lying.’ (This is a direct quote) I did not respond and he then took my thumb prints.
“At approximately 7 PM a military official informed us that four Americans, one of whom was a woman, and two Swedish men, would be joining us and we were to make room.
“At approximately 8:30 PM these six individuals entered our cell. No (sic) of the Americans were AS. and PGS [I am not using their full names.]. The other two were American youths in their twenties who had been vacationing in Chile. fraat (sic) mentioned this was their fourth detention.
PGS told me of seeing 500 people being executed as she and her husband were being broueht (sic) into the Stadium. I asked from what end ot (sic) the Stadium they had entered and she pointed in the direction. This was fron (sic) the end which Francis Flynn and I had heard the machine gun and pistol fire that morning.
“I asked A what he would estimate the number of peOp1e (sic) he sav (sic) being executed. He said 400. He then said, ‘What the hell do numbers mean? It was between 1400 and 500. l ' (Direct quote)
“Both PGS and AS were extremely nervous. They stated that they did not think they would be allowed to leave the Stadium alive after what they had witnessed.”
Mothers of persons who disappeared during Chile's military dictatorship demonstrate in downtown Santiago on March 3, 1998.
On June 29, 2025, the British publication The Guardian reported:
“In August 2023, the National Search Plan for Truth and Justice became an official state policy, with the aiming of centralizing information, finding the remains – or trace the final movements – of 1,469 disappeared people.
“A total of 40,175 people are registered victims of crimes under the Pinochet dictatorship ranging from imprisonment and torture to execution.”
The Guardian had previously reported (August 20, 2023):
“A total of 40,175 people are registered victims of crimes under the Pinochet dictatorship ranging from imprisonment and torture to execution.
“Of these, 1,092 are listed in the plan as forcibly disappeared and 377 as victims of political executions. Some were thrown into the Pacific Ocean or dumped in shallow graves in the Atacama desert and elsewhere…
“The remains of only 307 previously missing victims have been identified since the return to democracy in 1990.”
My parents never discussed my eleven days in the Estadio; it was too painful. The same way it must be painful for the families – fathers and mothers, sons and daughters of immigrants being rounded-up and sometimes disappeared for days or weeks – by ICE and Homeland Security.