This Day in History
Sept. 21, 1976: Sheridan Circle Car Bomb





Exiled Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier and Institute for Policy Studies staffer Ronni Moffitt were killed on Sept. 21, 1976 when a car bomb exploded as they drove around Sheridan Circle in Washington, D.C. Moffitt had been in the back seat with her husband, who survived.



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Assassination of Orlando Letelier

Coordinates: 38°54'42.7"N 77°3'1.1"W


Letelier in 1976

Location: Washington, D.C., U.S.
Date: September 21, 1976; 9:30 am (UTC-04:00)
Target: Orlando Letelier
Attack type: Car bombing
Deaths: 2
Injured: 1
Perpetrators: DINA

On 21 September 1976, Orlando Letelier, a leading opponent of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, was assassinated by car bombing, in Washington, D.C. Letelier, who was living in exile in the United States, was killed along with his colleague Ronni Karpen Moffitt, who was in the car with her husband Michael. The assassination was carried out by agents of the Chilean secret police (DINA), and was one among many carried out as part of Operation Condor. Declassified U.S. intelligence documents confirm that Pinochet directly ordered the killing.

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Attack


Ronni Moffitt, killed in the car bombing, worked at
the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.


This 1978 Central Intelligence Agency estimate
concludes that Chilean General Augusto Pinochet
"personally ordered" the assassination of former
Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier

Orlando Letelier was driving to work in Washington, D.C., on 21 September 1976, with Ronni Moffitt (January 10, 1951 – September 21, 1976) and her husband of four months, Michael. Letelier was driving, while Moffitt was in the front passenger seat, and Michael was in the back behind his wife. As they rounded Sheridan Circle in Embassy Row at 9:35 am EDT, an explosion erupted under the car, lifting it off the ground. When the car came to a halt after colliding with a Volkswagen illegally parked in front of the Irish Embassy, Michael was able to escape from the rear end of the car by crawling out of the back window. He then saw his wife stumbling away from the car and, assuming that she was safe, went to assist Letelier, who was still in the driver seat, barely conscious and appearing to be in great pain. Letelier's head was rolling back and forth, his eyes moved slightly, and he muttered unintelligibly. Michael tried to remove Letelier from the car, but was unable to do so, despite the fact that much of Letelier's lower torso was blown away and his legs had been severed.

Both Ronni Moffitt and Orlando Letelier were taken to the George Washington University Medical Center shortly thereafter. At the hospital, it was discovered that Ronni's larynx and carotid artery had been severed by a piece of flying shrapnel. She drowned in her own blood some 30 minutes after Letelier's death, while Michael suffered only a minor head wound. Michael estimated the bomb was detonated at approximately 9:30 am; the medical examiner report set the time of Letelier's death at 9:50 am and Moffitt's at 10:37 am, the cause of death for both listed as explosion-incurred injuries due to a car bomb placed under the car on the driver's side.

{Venezuelan politician and diplomat Diego Arria intervened once again by bringing Letelier's body to Caracas, Venezuela, for burial, where it remained until the end of Pinochet's rule.

Cover-up effort

A United States Department of Justice affidavit from August 23, 1991 detailed how, the Pinochet regime made efforts to cover up its role in the assassinations of Letelier and Moffitt. The extensive efforts were codenamed "Operación Mascarada".

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