A few hours after the sudden death of Alfredo Yabrán, an official of the U.S. Department of State confessed to me in his Washington office, "We all know that he committed suicide, but no one knows who did it." He was thinking aloud, trying to unravel the few elements – like pieces of an incomplete jigsaw puzzle – of the sinister plot that began in February 1996 with the face of the most influential businessman in Argentina and least known in the world taken by surprise for the first time in public on the cover of the magazine Noticias and which led in January the following year to the brutal murder of the man who took the photo, José Luis Cabezas.

Three years after the cold-blooded murder, committed on the same coastline where he had been photographed while strolling with his wife, the Buenos Aires provincial appeals court in Dolores found Yabrán guilty of masterminding the slaying and sentenced eight of his bodyguards to life in prison.

Yabrán never heard the verdict – he fatally shot himself in the mouth on May 20, 1998. He was alone, after spending 15 days in hiding at his San Ignacio ranch some 44 miles from Larroque, Entre Ríos province. So incredible was his end that people still believe him to be alive and well on a beach similar to Pinamar, where his photo had been taken and Cabezas was killed, under an assumed name and with altered facial features.

But one thing does not obviate the other. Among Argentines, disbelieving, untrusting and overwhelmed from birth by the incompetence of the justice system, there remains the feeling that the process in which Cabezas’ murderers were caught up could unravel some of the webs of corruption of those power.

There is already talk of a second round, instigated by the family.

In this phase, at least, the ongoing clamor of the people took priority over political will – "Don’t forget Cabezas," a cry that led the Carlos Menem government, with which Yabrán had business links in postal service, ports and private security, to distance itself from him. They left him on his own after receiving him at the Casa Rosada presidential palace by the then chief of staff, Jorge Rodríguez, while at almost the same time the president was offended at the mere mention of his name at a news conference he gave in New York.

There has been nothing more coarse, in fact, than an image of Yabrán with a photo showing just the eyes of his victim. Eyes that pierce, in contrast to the eyes that no longer see. Curious deaths in curious places. Calm, taking a nap. A nap disrupted by the sound of thunder. Of bullets where there was no war. That sealed the end of an innocent person and the sacrifice of a wanted person.

Yabrán’s course

The silent course that Yabrán charted in the halls of power began during the military dictatorship, continued under the democratic administration of Raúl Alfonsín and reached its zenith with Menem. He could not have foreseen what would be unleashed by the denunciation by Domingo Cavallo, champion of parity of the Argentine currency with the U.S. dollar, in August 1995 in Congress of the existence of mafias in power. It was a real catastrophe for an empire forged in mystery.

Mafias of which, according to the then economy minister who was no sympathizer of Menem, was one of the bosses. Or the capos. A more than sufficient reason to be fair game for the press. The harder he tried to prevent his children being photographed at school, so it was rumored, Cabezas in particular and Noticias in general were more justified in their interest in him. "The president is scared of him," Cavello once said.

Yabrán testified for seven hours in Congress on April 10, 1997, facing senators and representatives concerned about his links with those in power and especially the source of his great wealth, and after criticizing Cavallo for his handling of the privatization of the postal service they were left with more questions than answers.

He had already made another enemy, someone who had also distanced himself from Menem after serving as vice president of Argentina during Menem’s first term, Eduardo Duhalde, governor of Buenos Aires province and promoter of a police shakeup that led to a significant rise in crime and – no apple falls far from the tree – to the murder of Cabezas by former police officers.

The slaying could hardly have been a worse thing for Duhalde, who lost his bid for the legislature in 1997 and for the presidency in 1999. And he was a loser, too, by Yabrán’s suicide, as it took the wind out of his political sails. Concerning Cabezas, he was left a phrase that, if not [proclaimed by the former governor himself, then some of his supporters may have thought it – "They threw me a dead body."

A body that could no longer boast of the best police force in the world, according to his own words, and for which he immediately offered a $100,000 for information leading to the crime being solved. That amount was tripled a couple of days later, after asking even the FBI to take part in the investigation.

A body that was found handcuffed and burned, along with the vehicle and camera, in remote part of Pinamar, an oceanside resort some 210 miles south of Buenos Aires. According to court testimony, they were waiting for Cabezas at 5:15 a.m. on January 25, 197, at the front door of his home. He was returning from a party that was to wind up with breakfast at the home of businessman Oscar Andreani. They went up to him as soon as his got out of his car. They threatened him, struck him one or more times on the neck while others kept a lookout from a Fiat Uno car parked on a vacant lot across the road.

His fate appeared to have been sealed from the moment the two cars set off a desolate spot known as Manantiales over a dirt road that led to Salada Grande lagoon. Prellezo, the leader of the group, handcuffed him with Alcatraz brand cuffs; he carried a 32 caliber revolver with a red sight that had been seized by police in Valeria del Mar from local petty thieves.

They ordered him to kneel down and, execution style, shot him twice in the back of the head. He died instantly from massive brain damage. They put him back in the car then doused him with gasoline and set fire to him. The gun was never found.

"A quiet summer"

One month and two days after the murder, Prellezo took note of a warning from Yabrán: "I want to spend a quiet summer, without photographers or reporters." It was December 23, 1996. The private meeting, at the offices of Yabato S.A. (owned by Alpha, as his bodyguards called him) in Buenos Aires, lasted no more than five minutes. Five minutes in which he made it clear how much he hated, or feared, being in public view. A photograph was for him something like being shot in the face, he used to say.

His fears got to such a point that confronted by 443 (the code his bodyguards used to identify newsmen) he sent a vase as a gift to a labor union leader with a card saying – as is recorded on page 17,162, item 85 of the case file – "Happy birthday, if this does not serve as a decoration, use it to smash the head of some indiscreet photographer."

The murder of an indiscreet photographer – the symbol of free expression – led to conviction and life sentences for the following defendants: Gregorio Ríos, Yabrán’s chief bodyguard, Horacio Braga and Gustavo González (accomplices), Héctor Retana and José Auge (principal participants), Prellezo, Aníbal Luna and Sergio Camaratta.

The latter three are eligible for parole only after serving 25 years of their sentence, the others can be released after 16 years. Prellezo’s wife, Silvia Belawsky, also a former police officer, was acquitted after serving three years in jail for insurance fraud – she and her husband falsely claimed the car used in the murder had been stolen. Police officers Oscar Viglianco and Carlos Minisarco are to be questioned about alleged irregularities in the case.

There was no reason, the court ruled, for Ríos and Prellezo to kill Cabezas beyond the annoyance being photographed again would have caused Yabrán or perhaps publication 11 months earlier of his photo. Braga, Retana, Auge and González were paid 4,000 pesos ($4,000) for their dirty work. Luna took care of the preparations.

There are some loose ends, however. Gabriel Michi, a professional colleague of Cabezas, does not believe the ambush took place where it was said to have occurred. He thinks somebody else took part in it. Gladys Cabezas, the murdered man’s sister does not buy the argument that Yabrán being bothered was the only motive for the crime. People do not believe Duhalde’s stance – he said he had paid $50,000 for information and he knew where the firearm was, though its whereabouts remain unknown.

The Excalibur paging system shows that Yabrán had contacts with people in positions of power, such as Senator Eduardo Menem, the former president’s brother; Justice Minister Elías Jassan; Interior Minister Carlos Corach, and Radical Party members of the lower house of the national legislature Marcelo Bassani and Raúl Baglini of the same party as current President Fernando De la Rúa. "Apart form the Pope, he used to talk to everyone," Police Inspector Víctor Fogelman, who led the murder investigation, once said.

Unanimous demand for justice

The mark of Yabrán, investigated even by the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) of the United States, could be found in the most widely mentioned cases of corruption in the Menem administration, such as those involving arms smuggling, gold dealing and a spurious contract between Banco Nación bank and IBM.

The Cabezas case apparently promised to be nothing more than the death of a mailman (a nickname Yabrán gave himself due to his humble beginnings and his postal service interests). But what a bombshell it turned out to be, with unexpected repercussions for the Peronism of Menem and Duhalde. And in turn it united people in a unanimous demand for justice. A rare asset, for sure.

In a society that, according to most surveys, believes its politicians put their own interests above those of others (that many of them in fact do nothing but steal), the public will went to the forefront as never before. It was capable, for example, to discard the initial theory that the murder had been carried out by a gang called Los Pepitos – a tragi-comic name derived from the arrest of one Margarita Di Tullia, alias Pepita the Gunslinger, nightclub queen of Mar del Plata.

There was a spontaneous chain reaction to stop brushing the garbage under the carpet, to stop looking through the peephole in the door, thinking that the victim must have done something to deserve his punishment, to stop granting amnesty, making deals, letting people off, washing one’s hands of things.

The death of Cabezas, which transcended national borders, can only be compared with the death of Private Omar Carrasco, which was the beginning of the end of obligatory military service after putting a scare into the Army Chief Gen. Martín Balza during the Menem administration, and the death of María Soledad Morales, a teenager from Catamarca whose tragic end put checkmate to the Saadi family, a provincial dynasty with Peronist roots.

Cabezas was just one more, unknown until after death his name became a household word: don’t forget him. Don’t forget, either, those did away with him. And don’t forget those who could end up like him. To silence one means to silence them all. With the cowardice and treachery of times and verbs that seemed to be in the past tense in a country that has yet to shake off the nightmare of the Jewish targets in which (what a coincidence!) Buenos Aires police officers also participated.

Hideous crime in itself came to awaken the sleeping conscience of the people of Argentina, silenced through decades of threats, cruelty and absurd deaths and cold-blooded violence. The people now declare, "Don’t forget Cabezas, but please don’t forget Yabrán either."