Las Empanadas del Terror I La historia del horrendo crimen en Sewell I BJD

The Curse of Sewell: The Horrid Crime That Inspired the Tradition of Not Eating Empanadas During Fiestas Patrias Can you imagine spending Fiestas Patrias without eating empanadas? That's what happened for decades in Sewell, the mining town in the O'Higgins region where they began to avoid them during the celebrations on September 18th each year. The reason for this peculiar tradition is far from a change in the diet of those who once lived in what is now a World Heritage Site. In fact, it was the consequences of a horrendous crime in the middle of the last century that led to the non-consumption of this Chilean delicacy. María Isabel Hernández was 24 years old and the baker of Sewell, famous for its empanadas. She felt free when she went out to sell her pastries, but when she returned home, her world fell apart. Her husband, Antonio Foretich Triviño, 45, a worker at the Braden Copper mining company whom she met in Valparaíso, abused her physically and psychologically. At a time when legislation regarding violence against women was more precarious than it is today, she took a radical decision against her attacker. One night in March 1942, the young woman organized a social gathering at her home, inviting her mother. While the man was sleeping, she quietly entered the room and beat him to death, unleashing all her rage. With her mother's help, she dismembered him and wrapped the body parts in clothing to throw them away. Bags and bags were leaving her apartment, and even then, there were still remains that she had to get rid of to avoid discovery. Meanwhile, she fabricated that her husband was missing, that he had gone out shopping and never returned. Policeman Héctor Guzmán launched a search for the miner. "What a strange taste!" Desperately searching for a way out, she found her best ally in her kitchen: the meat grinder. That's how she came up with the idea of ​​giving her empanadas a special touch, the "secret ingredient" that no one was supposed to know about. Since there was a soccer game on Sundays, María Isabel set up shop on the sidelines to satisfy the hunger of the players and those in attendance. Everyone enjoyed her empanadas, but there was one person who never imagined she'd find a piece of finger in the pine tree. Rumors about the type of meat the woman was using spread throughout Sewell. The book "The Most Sensational Crimes in Chile," by writer Claudio Espinoza, detailed how the residents began to realize what they were consuming. A young man from that time stated: "Doña María gave me a piece of meat, telling me to eat it. I took it from her, but as soon as I was outside, I threw it in the trash because it disgusted me so much," the literary work states, adding that "many people warned that María would embed her husband's remains in the empanadas." "—How disgusting! I know someone who ate those empanadas and couldn't stop vomiting the next day. —So it was a finger... They told me the meat was very salty and that something similar to a finger had emerged." María Isabel confesses: these were her last days Police officer Guzmán continued leading the search operation, finding evidence that put Hernández on the hook: one of Foretich's legs and a shirt, which had been found in the mining town's aqueducts. The young woman eventually admitted to the crime, revealing new details. On Antonio's last day of life, he learned that she was cheating on him with Ángel Vergara, a twenty-something plumber, beating her to the point of exhaustion. In fact, the motive for killing him was to escape with the other man. On the same day she was transferred to the Buen Pastor women's prison in Rancagua, a forearm and hand belonging to Foretich were found. While awaiting trial, the psychiatric report requested by her own defense, seeking to have her declared "not liable," was released. "She possesses an 'explosive psychopathic personality,' committing the crime while suffering from a paroxysmal epileptic seizure," the document states. Ultimately, the court sent her to a mental hospital, stating that she could be released only if she no longer posed a danger to society. The last known event is that she was released a year after her confinement and spent her days in Codegua. For his part, the few remains of Foretich that were saved are in Rancagua's Cemetery 1. And Sewell was condemned to the memory of empanadas made with human flesh during the National Holidays. ---------------------------------------------------- Information: Via Meganoticias.cl Link: https://www.meganoticias.cl/nacional/...