Esteban Carmona is a principal associate in the Administrative and Constitutional Law area of Garrigues’ Santiago de Chile office. His practice focuses on regulatory public law, general and administrative penalty processes, constitutional litigation and legal opinions. He advises clients in proceedings involving government agencies, in disputes with the public authorities and on strategic planning and drafting of regulations. He has experience in both the public and private sectors, having worked for the Legal Department and General Secretariat of Universidad de Chile and for law firms specializing in public law.
Experience
He has over 10 years’ experience in his practice area, in both the public and private sectors. Before joining Garrigues, Esteban was a senior associate at Barros Silva Varela & Vigil (2022–2026), which he joined as an associate (2021–2022). Previously he had worked as an associate at law firm Mendoza, Oddo, Mori, Aguerrea & Gillmore (2018–2020) and as a lawyer at the Legal Department and General Secretariat of Universidad de Chile (2015–2017).
Esteban has specialized in handling administrative proceedings of all kinds, both general and specific, as well as penalty proceedings. He has advised public services, state-owned enterprises, private companies in regulated sectors and legal entities on matters of public interest, such as tenders, MOUs, administrative contracts, and drafting of legal rules and regulations. He has also participated in major constitutional and public law litigation, handling lawsuits before the high courts of justice, the Constitutional Court, the environmental courts and the Public Procurement Tribunal. He has extensive experience in handling cases before the Comptroller General of the Republic in order to obtain binding administrative interpretations for public services and/or to apply prior case law to specific cases. He has also drafted legal opinions on the scope and application of administrative rules.
For over 10 years he was a teaching assistant on the courses in Political Sciences and Constitutional Law programs at the Faculty of Law of Universidad de Chile. More recently, he has taught classes in Environmental Law at the Faculty of Law of Universidad Central.
Academic background
- Degree in Legal and Social Sciences, Universidad de Chile (2015)
- Admitted to practice law by the Supreme Court of Chile (2015)
- Postgraduate diploma in Administrative Law, with a specialization in General Administrative Law, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (2016)
- Postgraduate diploma in Constitutional Litigation and Remedies, Universidad de Chile (2017)
- Postgraduate diploma in Administrative Penalty Law, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso (2019)
- Master’s Degree in Constitutional Law, with a specialization in Constitutional Procedural Law, Chilean Center for Constitutional Studies (CECOCH), Universidad de Talca (2022)
Distinctions
- 2016 Constitutional Court Award. Best undergraduate thesis award for contribution to constitutional justice
Publications
- “La falta de servicio como criterio de imputación respecto de la responsabilidad del Estado Administrador” (Failure to Provide Proper Service as a Ground for State Liability). Cuadernos del Tribunal Constitucional N°64. 2016
- “Responsabilidad por falta de servicio en materia sanitaria y Ley Ricarte Soto. Un análisis dogmático y jurisprudencial” (junto a Luis Acevedo). (Liability for failure to provide proper service in healthcare and the Ricarte Soto Law. A Doctrinal and Case Law Analysis), with Luis Acevedo. Revista Actualidad Jurídica N°45, Faculty of Law, Universidad del Desarrollo. 2022