Antonio Imbert Barrera

Major General Antonio Cosme Imbert Barrera (December 3, 1920 – May 31, 2016) was a Dominican military officer and the 44th President of the Dominican Republic from May to August 1965.

Imbert, who plotted to assassinate dictator Rafael Trujillo in 1961, was one of the two rival rulers in the Dominican Republic from May 7, 1965, until August 30, 1965, amid the Dominican Civil War. He had succeeded General Pedro B. Benoit van der Horst who ruled for less than a week. After the civil war ended, both General Imbert and his rival Colonel Francisco Caamaño resigned, and Héctor García-Godoy, a civilian, was sworn as interim president.

According to Imbert, he fired the fatal shot at Trujillo.

Early life Imbert was born into a prominent family implicated in the murder of Domingo Marión in 1943.

Assassination of Trujillo On May 30, 1961, Trujillo was shot dead when his car was ambushed on a road outside the Dominican capital. Imbert, the driver of the ambushing vehicle, was accompanied by Antonio de la Maza, Salvador Estrella Sadhalá and Amado García Guerrero - the active participants who carried out the plot. Most of those involved in the assassination plot were subsequently captured and executed, with the exception of Imbert and Luis Amiama Tió. Imbert went into hiding until December 2.

After Joaquín Balaguer, Trujillo's figurehead president, was overthrown in 1962 and the Trujillo family was ousted, Imbert was declared a "National Hero" and was promoted to Major General with the special grant of it being ad vitam or lifelong. In the Civil War in the Dominican Republic of 1965 he led one of the factions in the struggle which faced the constitutionalist government led by Colonel Francisco Caamaño, who tried to bring back Juan Bosch to the country's presidency. Imbert's faction, called the Government of National Reconstruction was endorsed by the U.S. troops inspectors, in addition, he was one of the collaborators with the Americans, finally signing a peace act that put an end to the April war.

Later life On March 21, 1967, he was shot in Santo Domingo while traveling with Marino García,

He was Minister of Defense of the Dominican Republic from 1986 to 1988 (period in which he held the rank of Lieutenant General as incumbent of Defense); earlier that decade, his second-cousin Mario Imbert McGregor was also Minister of Defense. In 1989 he was assigned chairman of the board of directors of Rosario Dominicana. In September 2013, the Constitutionalist Soldiers of 25 April 1965 Foundation asked the National Congress of the Dominican Republic to explore the possibility of stripping Imbert his status of national hero as it considered that he went against constitutional precepts when he supported the coup against Bosch and the U.S. occupation of the country, among other accusations.

Imbert died on May 31, 2016, the day following the fifty-fifth anniversary of Trujillo's assassination, at the age of 95. Dominican President Danilo Medina declared three days of mourning. His niece, Carmen Imbert Brugal, said that cause of his death was complications of pneumonia.

Marriages and family He married Guarina Tessón Hurtado on September 10, 1939, in Puerto Plata. They had three children:

His wife died in 1970 in an aircraft accident. After widowing Imbert Barrera remarried to Giralda Busto Sánchez, but had no children from this marriage.

Cultural references Antonio Imbert is a character of Mario Vargas Llosa's novel The Feast of the Goat. In the film adaptation, he was played by Carlos Miranda.

Ancestry