The Criminal Oral Court of Curicó, a city located about 190 kilometers south of Santiago, sentenced Ketty Castro Cáceres this Tuesday for the crimes of fraud, forgery, and malicious use of a public instrument, after it was discovered in 2021 that she had kept the mummified corpse of her mother, Ketty Cáceres Barra, inside a house in the Maule Region for 11 years to collect her pension.
According to the investigation carried out by the Prosecutor’s Office, Castro forged documents with her mother’s fingerprint and presented them to the National Defense Pension Fund (Capredena) to continue benefiting from the pensions she received. She managed to collect more than 26 million pesos (equivalent to about 27,000 dollars) from the State.
The discovery of the body occurred in 2021, following a missing person report filed by the deceased’s grandson, Francisco – son of Ketty Castro – who tirelessly searched for his grandmother, the woman who raised him from a very young age and whom he last saw in 2010. The whereabouts of the elderly woman’s body were revealed after a dispute between mother and son.
One year after the discovery, the Homicide Brigade (BH) of the Investigations Police (PDI) of Curicó arrested Castro for her possible involvement in her mother’s death. However, that hypothesis was dismissed by Deputy Superintendent Juan Reyes, of the BH, who confirmed that the body showed no injuries attributable to third parties and determined that the woman remained alive until the period between January and July 2011.
According to the chief prosecutor of Curicó, Miguel Castro, the woman forged letters in which she was granted authorization by her mother to collect her pension, which she presented to Capredena. Additionally, she is believed to have benefited from other benefits through the state service ChileAtiende during the period corresponding to the Covid-19 pandemic.
During the trial, Ketty Castro’s defense appealed to possible criminal irresponsibility due to mental alienation. However, psychological evaluations conducted by the Legal Medical Service (SML) ruled out that possibility.
According to testimonies from people close to the deceased, Ketty Cáceres Barra, despite suffering from cancer, was a very independent woman. “She moved around everywhere by herself. She went out holding hands with her grandson [Francisco], because she raised him,” Ana Barra, a neighbor of the elderly woman, told Chilevisión in 2021. Barra also assured that Cáceres’ daughter was fully aware of her actions: “She came to pick up some things a couple of times and then closed the house forever. So, it’s doubtful.”
Some of Cáceres’ relatives believed she no longer lived in the Maule Region; others thought she was in a nursing home.
On September 25, the Criminal Oral Court of Curicó will carry out the sentencing reading, in which the penalty Ketty Cáceres will receive will be announced.