Argentina classifies 1956 José León Suárez shootings as crimes against humanity

Federal Judge Alicia Vence ruled that the June 9‑10, 1956 shootings of five Peronist civilians in the José León Suárez dump constitute crimes against humanity. The decision was issued in a “juicio por la verdad” that revisited the 1956 events first reported by Rodolfo Walsh in *Operación Masacre*. The court held the state responsible for planning and executing the executions ordered by the de facto leaders General Pedro Eugenio Aramburu and Admiral Isaac Rojas, as well as police officials Desiderio Fernández Suárez and Rodolfo Rodríguez Moreno.

Although all perpetrators are deceased, the judgment imposes a series of reparative measures: rehabilitation of the victims’ names, publication of the verdict in official bulletins, inclusion of the facts in national and Buenos Aires provincial curricula, installation of commemorative plaques, and creation of a “site of memory” at the former dump. The judge remarked, “Existen hechos cuyo juzgamiento conserva relevancia jurídica e institucional, aun cuando ya no resulte posible una respuesta penal.” The ruling marks a historic acknowledgement of state‑sponsored violence during Argentina’s 1950s military regime.