This article systematizes the historical and legal details of the experience presented by lonko Juan Pichún, traditional authority of the Mapuche community (lof) of Temulemu, focusing on the case of his father, the late lonko Pascual Pichún, one of the eight leaders in the Case of Norín Catrimán et al. (Leaders, Members and Activists of the Mapuche Indigenous People) v Chile in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The case, emblematic for exposing the criminalization of the demands Indigenous claims in Chile, was reviewed by the Inter-American Court in May 2013 for racial discrimination and lack of due process in the application of the Antiterrorist Law to leaders and ancestral authorities of the Mapuche Indigenous people who demanded territorial restitution. The paper addresses the procedural moments of the case in the Inter-American Human Rights System, which concludes with the Inter-American Court sentencing the State of Chile in 2014, with the respective measures of reparation to the Indigenous leaders. The historical relationship of the Mapuche people with the State of Chile and the history of territorial claims of the lof Temulemu are explored. Additionally, the consequences of the use of the Antiterrorist Law in the persistent criminalization of Mapuche political and territorial demands are reviewed, as well as the coping strategies deployed by people and communities to protect their culture and the territory to which they belong.