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April 25, 2002 The El Diario article went on to say that although local officials
are denying that the city's sewage-treatment process lacks chlorine,
the US side of the International Boundary and Water Commission
(IBWC) has noted problems with waste-water chlorine levels. Stench from treatment plants
Antonio Valenzuela, another El Paso resident affected by the odor from water treatment facilities in Cd. Juárez, said "The other day the smell was so bad my grandchildren refused to eat, and it's getting worse. I can't turn on the air conditioner because it just sucks the smell in." Sources: El Diario, April 22 & 25, 2002. Articles
by Pablo Hernández Batista. April 18, 2002 Twenty-one mothers of serial-killing victims from Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua took over the Chihuahua State capitol on Tuesday, April 16, 2002, according to an article in the Cd. Juárez newspaper, El Norte. The mothers were heard by a special commission of deputies
(the US equivalent of representatives) from most Chihuahua political
parties. Later, after some initial scheduling difficulties and
threats made by the mothers, they were given a fifteen-minute
appointment with Governor Patricio Martínez. That meeting
ended up lasting two hours, according to the El Norte article. In front of the Congress, Norma Ledezma, the mother of Paloma Angélica Escobar Ledezma who was raped and murdered in Chihuahua City in March 2002, told Chihuahua deputies "You listen to us, but you don't hear us. We need you to go beyond red tape, beyond one day of much publicity, one day of long articles in the newspapers . . . Today we want you to hear us." One unnamed mother told the legislature, "We hope for solutions and no more promises. We've come to Congress to ask for solutions but soon we won't come here anymore, we'll take more drastic actions." Another mother said, "They know who they are [the killers]
but they don't do anything because they are covering up for someone."
1. That government authorities put all means available into stopping crimes against women. ENOUGH! Authorities have an obligation to act; 2. The immediate recovery of all young missing women, that are alive, that have disappeared from Cd. Juárez, Chihuahua City and every corner of the state; 3. Rapid results in investigations and a public presentation about all those involved, no matter who is involved and no matter who falls from power because of this. We won't accept scapegoats who are being used to cover for the real killers; 4. Sufficient money and opportunity for the investigation of disappearances and crimes against women including special agents, experts, criminologists, an immediate alert system for disappeared women and those thought responsible for the crimes, and a DNA laboratory in Cd. Juárez; and 5. The appearance of the Attorney General before the Congress
to inform on investigations that have taken place so far. The meeting with Chihuahua deputies lasted one and half hours and the deputies made several proposals to the mothers. They agreed to propose to the full Congress that more funds be given to Cd. Juárez law enforcement and that the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social change its laws and provide better benefits to survivors as some only receive 200 pesos per month (approximately US$22). The special commission of deputies also promised to ask the Federal Attorney General's Office to accept DNA evidence that comes from private labs. This is linked to demands for independent DNA analysis made by some of the mothers that do not trust any results coming from government labs. The special commission of deputies was comprised of Martha Laguette Lardizábal (PRI), Alma Delia Urrutia Canizales (PRI), Elsy Paz Quintana (PAN), Héctor Barraza Chávez (PRD) and Jorge Arrellanes Moreno (PT). Like some of the victims' mothers, many of the deputies were in tears as they spoke. Urrutia explained to the mothers what the Congress had done so far in terms of helping with the issue of disappeared women and what it can and cannot do in the future. Laguette said to the mothers, "you came to make demands, and you have the right to do so, continue demanding justice . . . don't be afraid of anything." The governor responds Jesús Antonio Piñón Jiménez, the assistant attorney general for the state, was called into the meeting with the mothers by the governor himself. In front of the mothers, Governor Martínez instructed Piñón to give the mothers' daughters' cases individual attention. The governor also spoke about crime in Cd. Juárez and ordered the creation of a state organization that will assist families of the disappeared to locate their missing relatives. The group will begin in Chihuahua City and will then have an office in Cd. Juárez, he said. Governor Martínez also said that a DNA lab will be set up in Cd. Juárez but he was not sure when. Later, he invited the mothers to tour the state police office in Chihuahua City that same day. Source: El Norte, April 17, 2002. Article by Rodrigo Ramírez. An article in the El Paso times states that authorities believe that Allen and five others were responsible for bringing into the US approximately 164,000 pounds of marijuana since 1999. Allen's wife, Maria Luisa Olivas Allen, pleaded guilty to one charge of money laundering in March. She could receive a sentence of up to twenty years in prison at her sentencing on May 17. Also arrested in connection with the case were two Ciudad
Juárez residents, Alfredo Silva Olivas and Arturo Laredo
Molinar. They also plead guilty on April 11 and face penalties
ranging from five years to life in prison. The El Paso Times article went on to look at ECCO connections with murdered young women in Cd. Juárez. Liliana Holguin de Santiago's body was found in 2000. She was 15 at the time of her death and attended ECCO. She also worked across the street from ECCO on a part-time basis. Lilia Alejandra García, 17, attended ECCO. She was abducted on February 14, 2001. Police said she was held alive for approximately two days before she was murdered. She was abducted after leaving work. Maria Acosta Ramírez, 19, worked at a Philips maquiladora and was last seen on April 25, 2001 leaving ECCO. Her body was one of eight found in a field in November, 2001. Esmeralda Herrera Monreal, 15, had met with ECCO recruiters
at her house a few days before her death. She was one of eight
young women found in the cotton field in November, 2001. García and González have both repeatedly stated that they were tortured and coerced into confessing to the murder of Acosta, Holguin, Herrera and eight other women. Earlier this year, El Diario reported that Oscar Maynez, the
state police evidence expert, resigned from the state police
because he was asked to fabricate evidence against the two men.
Grupo Zeus, which is responsible for solving drug-related murders, has not solved any of the 15 narco-related killings that have occurred so far this year, according to the El Diario article. Similarly, the State Police's Homicide Department has 70% of its cases still open. The most effective state police group in closing murder cases has been the Office of the Special Investigator for Women's Murders. Five of nine cases have been solved by this group. However, the office has been under constant criticism since last year when it solved eleven rape murder cases by arresting two bus drivers who later said they were tortured into making false confessions. In a separate story, the head of the state police evidence
lab was fired in late March for not revealing that he had been
fired from the same organization in 1991 after being arrested
for drug trafficking and weapons violations. Héctor Enrique
Infante Silva, the director of the evidence lab and service,
was fired on March 27, 2002. On January 31, 2002, El Diario ran
an article about Infante's 1991 arrest when he was caught with
a one kilogram sample of marijuana, a stolen vehicle from El
Paso, over US$5,000 and an Uzi submachine gun, among other things.
In their attempt to quell the riot, 44 prisoners were sent by prison officials from the Cd. Juárez-area prison, known as the Cereso, to a similar facility about 250 miles south near Chihuahua City. The head of the prison, Luis Arturo Barragán González, was fired from his job and is being investigated for links to drug sales that take place in the facility, according to Guillermo Dowell Delgado, a Cd. Juárez city official. El Diario, a Cd. Juárez newspaper, attributed the riot to the prison administration's decision to stop the flow of drugs into the Cereso. According to the newspaper, inmates began rioting after some of them started to experience symptoms of physical withdrawal from drugs. Sergio Gallardo, a family member of one of the inmates, said that prisoners "have always had drugs both inside and outside, I don't know why they would take them away now." A mother of one of the inmates told El Diario that the riot was the fault of prison officials because, "They get the inmates addicted to drugs and then they take the crap away from them." A number of police units in anti-riot gear entered the prison to restore order. Describing their tactics, one journalist wrote that he saw a dozen prisoners with their hands handcuffed behind them and face down on the floor. When the drugged inmates could not stand up to form a line, one agent went up to all the prisoners and sprayed their faces with tear gas and punched them before leaving. That the men had already received drugs is possible, according
to the words of one witness. Jovita Morales said that guards then began throwing little packets
of drugs to the prisoners. Once they Source: El Diario, March 24 & 25, 2002. |