He was born in Cauquenes on 17 September 1928, the son of Luis Hurtado Manríquez and Olga Pereira.
He married Luz María Pinochet Arias, with whom he had ten children. Later, with Carmen Muñoz Guzmán, he had two more children.
He completed primary and secondary studies at the Escuela Población Santa Sofía of Cauquenes, at the Liceo de Hombres of the same city, and at the Internado Nacional Barros Arana (INBA), where he obtained his Baccalaureate in 1947. He studied law at the University of Chile, obtaining his law degree on 22 June 1956 with the thesis: La propiedad del empleo y la reforma de la empresa capitalista ("Employment property and the reform of the capitalist enterprise"). He later pursued postgraduate courses in the United States and other Latin American countries.
He worked as a lawyer in Cauquenes from 1956 to 1964, and taught Social and Political Sciences at the Military Academy between 1952 and 1962. He also served as assistant to professors Felipe Herrera and Orlando Letelier.[1]
Between 1950 and 1953 he was secretary to the Minister of Finance, and later worked as legal counsel to the Foreign Trade and Customs Council of the Central Bank of Chile.[1]
Hurtado began his political career in the Conservative Party, serving as president of the Cauquenes Youth branch between 1943 and 1944. He later joined the Falange Nacional, where he became national youth president until 1957, and then the Christian Democratic Party, where he became the first university youth president. In 1958 he headed the Eduardo Frei Montalva presidential campaign in Cauquenes.[1]
In the 1961 parliamentary election, he was elected deputy for the 13th Departmental Grouping (Cauquenes, Constitución, Chanco) for the period 1961–1965. He served on the Permanent Committees on Internal Government and on Foreign Affairs, and on the Special Committees on Sports and Physical Education (1961), Wine (1963–1965), and the Camelot Project investigation (1965).[1]
In 1962 he traveled to Cuba, invited by Fidel Castro, to participate in the Seminar on Civil Society and Politics in Latin America. In 1965 he traveled to the United States in preparation for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s state visit to Chile.[1]
Re-elected in 1965, he served until 1969, participating in the Permanent Committees on Foreign Affairs and on Constitution, Legislation and Justice. He also participated in the Special Committees on Economic Development; Chiloé, Aysén and Magallanes (1965–1966); and Madeco Copper Manufacturing (1966–1967).
On 10 March 1966 he was expelled from the Christian Democratic Party for disagreements with the leadership. He later published the pamphlet Felonía en Libertad (1968) explaining his reasons. He subsequently founded the Movimiento de Rebeldía Nacional (National Rebellion Movement), which later merged into the Social Democratic Party, where he served as deputy secretary general and president of the Political Commission.
In 1972 he joined the Christian Left, remaining until 1973.
After the coup d'état of 11 September 1973, Hurtado was detained in the National Stadium and then transferred to the Chacabuco concentration camp, where he remained imprisoned for one year.
Between 1974 and 1989 he worked as a lawyer in Santiago and engaged in farming in his family estate "San Ignacio" in Cauquenes. In 1979 he attended a Human Rights seminar led by Professor Joaquín Ruiz-Giménez at the Complutense University of Madrid. He also studied journalism, graduating in 1989, and that same year was appointed notary public in Los Vilos, serving until 1993.
He died in Santiago on 27 October 2014.