Marcelo Ariel Gelman Schubaroff

Desaparecido Agosto 8, 1976

From the Desaparecidos Memory WalMarcelo was 20. He studied at the Colegio Nacional de Buenos Aires at the Faculty of Arts at the University of Buenos Aires. He was a poet and an independent journalist, as was his father, the famous poet Juan Gelman. Marcelo had always been interested in the struggle for justice, and had served in different movements. At the time of his disappearance Maria Claudia was 19. They had just bought a home, in July '76, and Maria Claudia was 7 months pregnant.

On August 24, 1976, a few days later, heavily armed forces went to the home of Berta Schuberoff, Marcelo's mother. The forces also went to the home of Nora Gelman, Marcelo sister and a friend of hers. Nora and her friend were forced to approach the home of Marcelo and Maria Claudia, who were earlier abducted from their home by Orletti personnel and taken to the camp. Apparently the name of Marcelo appeared on the agenda of a "vanished list" that had belonged to the ERP. The partner and best friend of Marcelo, William Binstock, was arrested and disappeared a few days later. Nora Gelman and her friend were released 48 hours later.

Marcelo and Maria Claudia were seen in the detention center Orletti Automotive, the center of the Argentine-Uruguayan operations of Condor. They were tortured and Marcelo, in October 1976, was killed by a shot in the neck, shot from two feet away. His body was hidden inside a 200 liter drum filled with cement and sand. His remains were exhumed by the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team in 1989.

Maria Claudia was secretly moved to Montevideo in mid October 1976 on a flight piloted by the current commander of the Air Force, Brigadier José Pedro Malaquina. He was detained along with other Uruguayans in the office of the Defense Information and the army. When it was time to give birth, she was taken to the Military Hospital of the Armed Forces, where she gave birth to a daughter. There she could breastfeed for a few days and before they the daughter away. Maria Claudia was then taken to a clandestine detention center known as Valparaiso Army. From there captain Ricardo Medina killed her. The baby girl went to the hands of Colonel Jorge Silveira and police captain Ricardo Medina. They surrendered in Uruguay in January 1977 and the Commissioner (now deceased) granted Medina the baby girl to raise as his own daughter.

After an intensive search in Argentina and Uruguay, and political pressure from the government of Uruguay, the Uruguayan government gave details of the identity of the girl. It did DNA tests and confirmed her identity in mid-2000. The girl, Maria Macarena, could then return to her native family.