Lori Berenson - Activities in Peru and Arrest

Activities in Peru and Arrest

In Peru, Berenson met members of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA), a group that had committed numerous terrorist attacks in Peru including kidnapping, bank robberies, extortion, hostage taking, and assassinations. Berenson, however, denies knowing that they were MRTA members.

Berenson co-rented a large house in Lima in an upscale neighborhood. Much of the house was later used as a safe house by MRTA operatives, with up to 15 of them occupying their part of the residence. Berenson later claimed to be unaware of the connection and to have moved out some months prior to her arrest.

Berenson obtained press credentials for herself and her photographer to the Congress of Peru, papers which were later reported by the media to be "false journalist credentials" However her support website states that "After half a decade of hands-on experience ... Lori was able to obtain assignments from two U.S. publications, Modern Times and Third World Viewpoint, to work as a free-lance journalist. She secured appropriate press credentials in Lima. At the time of her arrest she was researching articles about the effects of poverty on women in Perú. Her parents are in possession of some of the transcripts of her work, but the Peruvian anti-terrorist police took most of it when her apartment was searched." Her photographer, Nancy Gilvonio, was actually the wife of Néstor Cerpa, the MRTA second-in-command — although Berenson claims she was unaware of this connection and claimed that she knew her only as a Bolivian photographer. Berenson had entered the main Congress building with Gilvonio several times during 1995 to interview members of Congress. Gilvonio was alleged to have provided the information she collected to the MRTA including detailed information on the floor plans of Congress, its security and members. The plan was for the MRTA to invade the Congress building, kidnap the legislators, and exchange the hostages for MRTA prisoners.

On November 30, 1995, Berenson and Gilvonio were arrested on a public bus in downtown Lima. Berenson was accused of being a leader of the MRTA, which had been officially classified as a terrorist group by the government.

Within hours the government launched an all-night siege of the MRTA safe house previously rented by Berenson during which three MRTA guerrillas and one police officer died and 14 guerrillas were captured. The safe house was found to contain an "arsenal of weapons", including 3,000 sticks of dynamite. Diagrams, notes, weapons, and police and military uniforms found at the safe house suggested that the group was planning to seize members of Congress and trade them for captured guerrillas. Police also seized a floor plan and a scale architectural model of the Congress building from the safe house. After being taken to the house siege, in which Berenson claims she was used as a human shield by the Peruvian police, both women were taken to the DINCOTE (División Nacional Contra el Terrorismo, or National Counter Terrorist Division).

On January 8, 1996, the DINCOTE hosted a news event in which they showed Berenson to the press. At the event, she shouted, her fists clenched to her sides, "There are no criminal terrorists in the MRTA.; it's a revolutionary movement!" That image continues to make her unpopular in Peru. Her supporters later claimed that her vehement defense of MRTA came about because she was angry over the treatment of a wounded cell mate and that she was instructed by authorities to shout in order to be heard.