Fabiola Letelier, Chilean human rights activist, dies at 92

One of the most brazen acts of state-sponsored terrorism ever perpetrated in the United States took place on Sept. 21, 1976, when Orlando Letelier, a Chilean exile and leading critic of strongman Augusto Pinochet, was assassinated in a car bombing on Washington’s Embassy Row.

Letelier, a former ambassador to the United States and Cabinet minister in the Marxist government of Salvador Allende, drove down Massachusetts Avenue NW that morning, then rounded his way onto Sheridan Circle. There, a remote-controlled explosive device detonated under his vehicle, killing Letelier and an American colleague, Ronni Moffitt. Moffitt’s husband, Michael, was also present in the car and survived.