[2] Jeria served informally in the role of first lady during the first Bachelet government, accompanying her daughter to several official functions.

Jeria did not have the opportunity to finish her studies in archaeology because she was detained, with her daughter Michelle, and transferred to the centres of the DINA Villa Grimaldi and Cuatro Alamos, where she suffered torture.

[6] After being freed and expelled from the country, Jeria lived in exile in Australia, where she began activist work against the military dictatorship of Pinochet, traveling to Mexico, Cuba and the Soviet Union.

[7] She also lived in the German Democratic Republic to stay with her daughter Michelle, who was studying medicine at Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany.

In 1977, Jeria traveled to Washington, D.C. to testify on human rights violations in Chile, following the murder of Orlando Letelier.

Jeria received the prize "Monseñor Leonidas Proaño" for contributions to the defense of human rights in the region.