While Chile remains divided after the death of the former dictator Augusto Pinochet, the victims of his purges grieved in disbelief that justice will never be served.
General Pinochet died aged 91 from a heart condition on Sunday. In the last eight years he faced continuous legal battles, charged with crimes against humanity, torture and fraud which he allegedly committed after seizing power in 1973 from the then socialist President Salvado Allende.
More than 3000 are believed to have disappeared and over 26,000 were tortured during his dictatorship between 1973-1990.
In 1998 General Pinochet was arrested in London, following an international warrant issued by a Spanish judge. It is the highly publicised nature of his case that led some experts to view it as a major icebreaker for human rights trials.
"For the first time conspicuous efforts were made to try somebody for the crime he has allegedly perpetrated while in office and the fact it was done in the West, in Britain…heightened the drama of the case," said Professor David Kinley, a human rights law expert from the University of Sydney.
Professor Kinley also highlights that despite General Pinochet escaping a formal verdict the legacy of his trial will remain as a reminder to other human rights abusers who remain at large, like Chad's former leader Hissène Habré or former Chinese Communist Party leader Jiang Zemin.
"[The idea of] universal jurisdiction and…that rulers and former rulers may not claim immunity after they stop ruling, that's the main legacy of Pinochet," said Professor Kinley.
However the inability of European courts to extradite General Pinochet, followed delays in Chilean legal proceedings after his return to South America in 2000, has left many of the families of General Pinochet's victims disillusioned.
"I wish he had been condemned," said Isaebl Allende, the daughter of Chile's late President who died during the 1973 coup.
General Pinochet became the second human rights abuser to die this year before reaching a final court verdict, after Serbia's Slobodan Milosevic was found dead in his prison cell in March.
Amnesty International said General Pinochet's death "should be a wake-up call for the authorities in Chile and for governments everywhere, reminding them of the importance of speedy justice for human rights crimes."
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