Massacre of the Artunduaga family

This took place in a village called El Topacio, Caquetá. It is the story of the Artunduaga family… of the mother, the father and five children.

One of the sons joined the paramilitaries and was working for them. When the guerrillas found out, they told the father that they had better leave the farm. They couldn´t afford to have people in the área whose sons were collaborating with the enemy. Either they served the guerrillas, or no one.

Their land was prosperous and they grew coca plants.

They were given notice on a Saturday that they had to leave their farm as soon as possible. They replied that the harvest was due the next week, that they were going to hire hands to help them scrape the coca leaves, and then they would leave.

They got up early on Monday to scrape the coca leaves as fast as they could.

But you don’t mess with the guerrillas…. You don’t argue with them.

They found that the family had not obeyed their orders and came down on them. They tied the mother, the father and the son, each to a tree.

Some of the workers were shot right there on the farm.

The woman, as she heard the rattle, could only scream for help. The father and the young one were beaten to death.

The woman was left behind, tied to the tree. Other workers, when they realized the guerrillas had left, came and untied her. She ran to find her dead son and husband.

She could not stay on the farm for long, barely one month. She left because she almost went mad.

That was another very, very painful story which I had to live through.