allende mexico massacre victims

And outside the house there were four people with long arms who were dressed in black and had on bulletproof vests. He didnt have anything to do with crime, nor did his family, since they were kidnapped by mistake.. But as the investigation picked up steam in 2014, dozens of people, including local firefighters, law enforcement officers, civilian eyewitnesses, and municipal officials, came forward to describe a city government almost completely immersed in the criminal structure of Los Zetas, including the mayor and top police officials. The 2011 massacre carried out by the Zetas drug cartel in Allende, Mexico was a shocking reminder of the brutality of the black market, which thrives under governmental drug . [5] The Mexican government signaled its intention to soften some of the more severe restrictions imposed by the new law. May 29, 2021. In 2017, a group led by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH)submitted a communicationto the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) detailing crimes committed against the civilian population in Coahuila, including murder, illegal imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture and sexual violence, not just from March 2011 but from a seven-year period from 2009-2016. 8:01. The government should do more to find them. Diego Osorno, a reporter from the newspaperMilenio, has examined various new sources of evidence related to the Allende case in a series of recent articles. Sergio Aguayo is a prominent Mexican human rights investigator at the Colegio de Mexico, which last year launched an independent probe into the Allende massacre. 2011 San Fernando massacre - Wikipedia The Seminar on Violence of the Colegio de Mxico had access to many of these files in preparing its groundbreaking reports on Allende and a second report on how the Zetas gained control of authority structures in Coahuila, including the state prison in Piedras Negras. InMilenio, Diego Osorno writes aboutThe Sad Case of the Two Sergio Garzas,Juniors uncle and cousin, who were murdered, along with other family members, in March and August 2012part of a continuing effort by Los Zetas to eliminate loose ends from within the Garza family. A study from the Human Rights Clinic of the University of Texas Law School examined the trial transcripts of Zetas members prosecuted for drug trafficking, money laundering, and homicide in U.S. federal courts. Alone on a remote mountain road after witnessing the slaughter of nine close relatives, the wounded children who had survived a cartel ambush in . Elizondos wife,Etelvina Rodrguez, said she soon realized that many of the wives of those who worked at the Garza ranch were looking for their husbands.. Nearly all of those interviewed agreed that the surge in violence and the general pattern of police cooperation with the Zetas was evident for at least a year or two before the March 2011 massacre. Mexico's San Fernando Massacres: A Declassified History American authorities eventually helped Mexico capture the Trevios but never acknowledged the devastating cost. The attack . Isabel Allende was born on August 2, 1942, in Lima, Peru, to Toms and Francisca Allende. Gunmen open fire in a roadside eatery, leaving nine customers dead in pools of blood. Villa Unin, just a 20-minute drive from Allende, has been the site of numerous acts of violence linked to the CDN in recent years. Hours later, his daughter was one of the last people to see him alive. Lilianas husband, Arturo, had also been unable to reach his wife or her parents. In a country where murders and disappearances are troublingly common, the scale and the horrific details of the Allende massacre case still stand out. Photograph via . Washington, D.C., March 18, 2021 Ten years ago, the Mexican municipality of Allende was the site of one of the worst human rights atrocities ever seen in the country: a three-day rampage that punctuateda larger wave of violencein which theLos Zetas criminal groupkidnapped, murdered, and later burned the bodies of as many as 300 victims, incinerating the remains into piles of ashes, bits of teeth, and tiny bone fragments. "Nos rene la necesidad de enfrentar como pas y como Estado . Residents of the small town of Villa Union, 12 miles from Allende, said Tuesday . One of the homes destroyed in Allende in 2011. shares. And I did not know exactly what happened with them.- Declaration of Allende firefighter Jess Gerardo De Len Ramos, December 17, 2014, 14:50, The former fire department volunteer described a similar scene as the victims, including several elderly captives, were led to slaughter. Did United States Trigger a Drug Cartel Massacre in Mexico? Seven people are gunned down at a streetside taco stand. Mass shooting at Mexico's San Miguel Totolapan kills 18, mayor among The mayor of Allende in the Cinco Manantiales region of Coahuila said at the time of the slaughter that he was helpless to prevent the massacre. Is Netflix drama Somos. based on a true story? - Radio Times There were not many of us. According to multiple local media reports, the massacre happened on Wednesday afternoon when an armed group opened fire at the city hall of San Miguel Totolapan, resulting in the . Few had the courage to defy Los Zetas. Subscribe to our newsletter and join other 2,442 Justice in Mexico readers! 0:04. A story about the 2011 massacre in the Mexican border town of Allende Beyond criminal prosecutions, the Mexican government also has a specific legal obligation to divulge information related to cases, like Allende, that constitute clear violations of human rights and humanitarian law, raising the hope that additional information may come to light through the countrys access to information law. During the two years she spent investigating the role of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in the 2011 massacre in Allende, Mexico, she worked to understand and portray that reality of . And he was waiting for his brother-in-law [Later,] he told me that they spent the entire night looking for his family; that he had entered the ranch from the back through an opening, and that he realized that he was alone in the ranch house, and that he was there with the expectation that they were holding his sister and his niece and nephews all with the last name Espinoza Garza, who on the day of the acts were seven months, three years, and six years of age.- Complaint of Sarah Angelita Lira, November 11, 2014. On the afternoon of March 20, aman reported the March 18 disappearance of his wifes parents and five other family members. I want to point out that all of the police at that time were getting money from the Zetas, some by obligation and some by choice. American authorities eventually helped Mexico capture the Trevios but never acknowledged the devastating cost. Remembering the Allende Massacre - BlogTest El Pjaro said that a group of victims that had been tied up inside the ranch house were later taken out back to the bodega where they were killed with a shot to the head. The soldiers found doors torn off, the building sacked, spent shell casings, dead animals, burned buildings, and a pick-up truck riddled with bullet holes, but no people. Netflix drama series Somos. And after five or six hours during which the corpses were cooked it was then around five or six oclock in the morning. Arts & Culture. If you experience a barrier that affects your ability to access content on this page, let us know via ourContact form. In March 2011 witnesses say the notorious Zetas cartel abducted at least 300 people in northern Mexico, but a local investigation still has a long way to go to identity all the perpetrators - and . The town's mayor believes 30 to 40 Allende families were exterminated, and he has a list of 34 houses that were destroyed. In a prior incident, testimony revealed that Vasquez participated in the massacre of numerous people in Piedras Negras and Allende, Coahuila, Mexico, at the hands of Los Zetas members in March of 2011. Amunicipal official present at the March 22 meetingsaid that the mayor was upset because various members of staff had left the offices on Monday [March 21, 2011], [and] that he had not given any indication that they should go out. About the violence, the mayor reportedly said, Well, thats between them, which is to say, alluding to members of organized crime, you have to stay calm. But the group did not take or agree to take any type of action with respect to what was happening or to notify someone else about what was happening in the city, according to the testimony. So I left the ranch in my truck and went home, and since that date I dont know anything about what happened to my husband.- Declaration of wife of heavy machinery mechanic for Rodolfo Garza, July 23, 2014. Oscar nominated screenwriter/producer James Schamus makes his television debut with 'Somos,' a six-part Netflix drama about a real-life cartel massacre in the Mexican town of Allende. El Pjaro said it was left to him and El Chucho to set fire to the house, the bodega, and everything inside, including the many dead bodies. Among the evidence are the first complaints filed by the loved ones of those who went missing, the sworn declarations of Zetas members, Allende police and other city officials, the statements of firefighters and others who witnessed the violence, along with hundreds of pages of forensic reports, crime scene photos and related material. Following the title sequence is a short paragraph introducing the story of Allende, a Mexican border town unexpectedly overtaken by a powerful drug cartel that . Over three consecutive days in March 2011, a series . The situation was especially dire in Piedras Negras, where Los Zetas had turned the state prison into a center of operations. The National Security Archive marks this grim anniversary by publishing an evidentiary history of the Allende massacre focusing on key documents and testimony from a 4,000-page dossier of investigative records compiled by Mexican prosecutors in the state of Coahuila.[3]. And they went to the Ranch but did not find anyone, and told us that they had scoured the place but had not found anyone.- Complaint of Elvira Espinoza, November 4, 2011. [14] In many cases, the names of the people identified by firefighters Lpez Tamez and De Len Ramos are legible behind clumsily applied redactions. Oneformer member of the Allende policeinterviewed in July 2014 told investigators that from the moment that I joined the ranks of the municipal police I realized that all of the people I mentioned previously, including the mayor, the police director, police commander, and the shift commanders, were linked to the Zetas criminal organization., One of the first witnesses to talk about the police departments links to Los Zetas was anAllende municipal official in charge of road maintenance, who in January 2014 told investigators that everyone knows about [the March 2011 Allende massacre] but is too afraid to say anything.. Through the gate, she could see what appeared to be bodies piled up next to a burning building. Both in charge of Los Zetas, Allende's is a much less known story. The tenth anniversary of the Allende killings comes as allegations of narcotics-related corruption among top Mexican officials have brought U.S.-Mexico security ties to their lowest point in many years. Las Cruces bowling alley massacre still unsolved after 30 years 2018 is on track to be Mexico's deadliest year on record with over 20,000 homicides so far. Relatives of victims wait in anguish for news after a shooting July 1 at a drug rehabilitation center . And together with the patrols there were many cars and trucks both inside and outside the ranch, and these people carried long arms from which I deduced that these people were from Los Zetas.- Declaration of Allende firefighter Jess Gerardo De Len Ramos, December 17, 2014, 14:50. World News Day: A town, a massacre, a decade of silence in Mexico's Allende [H]e was telling me that he wanted to look for the Zetas to see what they were asking for the return of his family. The horrifying persistence of brazen cartel attacks like these is a reminder of how little has changed in Mexico, especially in the border states of Coahuila, Tamaulipas, and Nuevo Len. Leaving aside the role of the DEA and the wider implications of the case, todays posting focuses on the most revealing documents among the facts-on-the-ground evidence gathered by the state of Coahuila. As ocurri la brutal y olvidada masacre de Allende - BBC News Mundo For reference to U.S. training and other background, see our previous Electronic Briefing Book, especially Document 1 and Document 2. 92110 United States [email protected] +1 619-260-2299. They are included here in brackets. Edited by Michael Evans. In towns like Allende, Los Zetas relied mainly on local recruits and corrupt officials to protect their narcotics operations, shake down local businesses, and keep watch for rival gangs and other threats. Report says Mexico state officials ignored massacre | AP News Forensic specialists from the Mexican Federal Police examine one of the primary crime scenes from the 2011 Allende massacre on January 28, 2014. The same year, the Zetas member known as El Cubano was arrested in the U.S. and later extradited to Mexico in connection to the case. The files depict a town almost completely beholden to LosZetasfrom the mayors office to top police commanders to ordinary cops on the street. Whereas, according to a 2016 interview of Coahuila attorney general Homero Ramos Gloria, the Mexican government has identified only 28 human remains and 54 . Ginger Thompson, ProPublica A disturbing report released today by researchers at the prestigious Colegio de Mexico provides new details about a 2011 massacre in Allende, a quiet Mexican ranching town less than an hour's drive from the United States, and suggests that many more people were killed in the incident than estimated by Mexican authorities. I still love Mexico. He told me that we were not up for parties, she said. I saw that they took two people out of the house, but I could not distinguish who they were. Jeremy Schwartz. Tracing the missing | The Economist In a sworn statement, El Pjaro said the Zetas coordinated the kidnappings with high-ranking officials of the Allende municipal police department, who were present during the abductions and who carried the victims from the house to the ranch in a police patrol vehicle. In November 2019, CDN gunmenriddled the city hall with gunfireand engaged in a gun battle with federal forces that leftat least 21 dead. What Do American Officials Know About the Allende Massacre? US Intelligence Helped Cause 2011 Massacre in Mexico Soon, Coahuila state authorities discovered links to other violence in the regionin Piedras Negras, on the border, and across the Cinco Manantiales (Five Springs), a group of neighboring towns in northern Coahuila that includes Allende, Morelos, Nava, Zaragoza and Villa Unin, site of numerous cartel attacks in recent years. When we arrived at the ranch, they went inside the houses and I began to hear many shots fired and people shouting, and they began to throw the bodies of dead people in the bed of the truck, and later they tellme Get down here, asshole, and tie up this fucking bitch I tied up a man who seemed to be a worker at the Garza ranch, but I did not know this person. ALLENDE, Coahuila - Only abandoned and destroyed farms and the self-imposed silence of the inhabitants of Allende remain after the massacre perpetrated in this city in . While many of the corpses were probably destroyed in these larger fires, the Los Zetas cook interviewed on September 19, 2014,gave an especially detailed description of how he and El Chango together burned the bodies of at least three victims in individual barrels filled with diesel fuel. Founded in 2002 as the enforcement arm of the notorious Gulf Cartel, the first members of Los Zetas were recruited from a Mexican special forces group known as GAFE (Grupo Aeromvil de Fuerzas Especiales), members of which were trainedat the U.S. Army School of the Americas at Ft. Benning, Georgia. What actions had they taken to guarantee the security of the people of Allende? An Allende police radio operator who worked closely with the shift commanders said in his declaration that a ranking Zetas member[17]would sometimes come by the police station and take people from city jail cells with the full knowledge of the police director and commander, both of whom, he said, were paid by the Zetas. 2130 H Street, NW Netflix series inspired by story of 2011 massacre in Allende, Coahuila Another explained that he stopped cooperating with the Zetas after they kidnapped his father. Triggered a Massacre in Mexico" was published in 2017 by the investigative news agency ProPublica.. Of particular importance was the November 2014 testimony of a woman from Piedras Negras whose husband, himself a member of the Zetas, had been kidnapped, detained, and later killed by the group in 2010. Many needed the money. He just asked us if we knew about what was happening. Some portions of these files have been excerpted elsewhere, including in reports from the CNDH and the Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI), which cites many of these same records.But this is the first time that images of records from the case file have been published in their original form (although . But he never came back. September 27, 2019 1:06 PM EDT. When the Zetas became aware of our presence, and that we were there to put out the fire, they said to us: You guys get the fuck out of here! Zetas. Early in the morning on March 19, Arturo called his own mother, Elvira Espinoza, and told her that neither Liliana, who worked for her fathers ranch business, nor her parents were answering their phones. Go fuck your mother! They erected a monument in Allende to honor the victims without fully determining their fates or punishing those responsible. * * * * *. The collection of testimonies found in the files of Coahuila state prosecutors depict a town almost completely beholden to the criminal groupfrom the mayors office to top police commanders to ordinary cops on the street. Also the commander, [Hernndez Ramos], who never did anything since he also was working for the Zetas and received money, but I dont know how much And [an unnamed Los Zetas member] would come in like he was in his own house, without anyone saying a thing about it.- Declaration of former Allende police official, November 12, 2014, 17:30, Multiple witnesses said that Trevio called them to a meeting three days before the massacre began on March 18, 2011, telling them that he and Lozano had met with Los Zetas and had agreed to stand down municipal authorities for the criminal group. When they did not return or respond to phone calls, their wives became concerned. September 29, 2020, Five Years Later, the Search Continues In the worst cases, civilian authorities were little more than subcontractors of the Zetas criminal organization, involved in shakedowns, kidnappings, drug trafficking and numerous murders, not over a period of weeks or months, but for many years. Among other evidence is thestatementof a former Allende police official, Fernando Hernndez Reyes, who gave a vivid account of his involvement in the kidnappings. Inside the gate, a small building was burning. When Garcas wife drove past the Garza ranch the next morning she spotted a group of hooded, armed men inside while Allende police stood watch outside the entrance. It was around March 15, 2011, the then-director of the municipal police called all the elements to a meeting in the offices of the municipal police. Or do you want the same thing to happen to you or to your families?-Declaration of Allende fire chief, December 17, 2014. "Somos." de Netflix: as fue la brutal y olvidada masacre de Allende en MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexican drug gang bosses furious at suspected turncoats sent commandos aided by local police to seize dozens perhaps hundreds of people, murder them and dispose of their bodies in a town near the Texas border, yet state and federal officials ignored the massacre for years, according to a government-backed report released Sunday. 'Somos' Review - The Hollywood Reporter And when I finished tying him up, I put him in the back of the truck, and there were already bodies in the trunk.- Declaration of Zetas member, September 19, 2014. Meanwhile, Mexico has announced the arrest of police officers allegedly involved in the killings. It is not clear why members of the the military unit thatexamined the ranch did not secure the property or, evidently, take any additional steps to comprehend what was happening in Allende. She spoke by phone to Fernando Purn, the mayor of Piedras Negras who told her that her son was probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time. He told her the most likely outcome was that Gerardo would be released because it was a mistake. Speaking again later that night, around 3:30 AM on March 19, she said the mayor told her that it hurt him very much, what we were going through, and he hung up. So I went to my friends house who lives only two blocks away to tell her this; but in the few minutes I was with my friend, my daughter [called] to tell me that her father was going on a trip [S]o I headed home, and when I was about 50 meters away, a white, double-cab, Tundra pick-up truck arrived, and I see my husband leave the house with his dirty clothes on. According to testimony, the police would also arrest and detain people wanted by the Zetas, keeping them in the city jail until the Zetas arrived to take them away. The acrid odor of diesel fuel hung in the air. One U.S. law enforcement officialsaid that [Reyes] Arzates corruption as the highest-ranking officer in the MFPs Sensitive Investigative Unit allowed violent cartels to continue the flow of drugs through the region without consequence.. The 2020 U.S. arrest of Mexicos former defense secretary, Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos, for alleged narcotics ties has led Mexicos president, Andrs Manuel Lpez Obrador, tofast-track a new lawimposing strict new restrictions on U.S. personnel in Mexico and that threatens to significantly curtail the exchange of intelligence and law enforcement information. Hundreds Believed Disappeared in Allende Massacre - Al Jazeera Elvira Espinoza told investigators about the day, about a week later, when she found two of her three missing grandchildren at an orphanage in Piedras Negras. They erected a monument in Allende to honor the victims without fully determining their fates or punishing those responsible. [13] Bracketed items identified in portions of the Herrera Estrada declaration published by Zcalo. But a2017 investigation by Ginger Thompson of ProPublicafound that Cuellar and Junior weretargeted for another reason: Los Zetas leaders had discovered that members of Cuellars cell were cooperating with agents of the DEA and had provided them with secret PIN codes allowing the DEA to track the mobile phones of top Zetas leaders. I n the dead of night on Jan. 28, 1918, a group of white Texas Rangers, U.S. military men and local ranchers burst into the homes of Mexican and Mexican American . For the family members, nothing has changed. LAS CRUCES - On Feb. 10, 1990, two men walked into a Las Cruces bowling alley and shot seven people execution style including four children robbed the bowling alley's safe and set . On March 20, 2011, my husband and I went to the Garrison of Kilometer 53 to talk with the military officials and we told them what had happened. On the evening of March 20, 2011, Yuliana Lpez Ibarra heard the sounds of gunfire and the desperate cries of her mother-in-law coming through the tiny speaker on her husbands cell phone. In return for the departments cooperation, most officers received 2,000 to 3,000 pesos per month (about $175-260 USD) from Los Zetas. Many of the nine women and children killed on a remote stretch of highway in northern Mexico Monday were shot at point-blank range -- victims of a targeted assassination that Mexican authorities . Despite the brutality of the case, major U.S. TV and print outlets have largely ignored the kidnapping and murder of hundreds of people from Allende, Coahuila. December 9, 2020, Six Years On, Ayotzinapa Investigations Advance I didnt know which of them woke me up with cold water since Id been asleep. The perilous path Central American migrants take while traveling through Mexico to reach the U.S. border has been an area of . in Allende, Coahuila state, Mexico, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2019. Prosecutors say that Reyes took hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes from the cartels during his 13-year career at the SIU, including large payments from the Sinaloa and Beltran-Leyva cartels, among others. [W]e all went in shooting and tied up all the people that were found inside the ranch. The US shares the blame for a massacre in Mexico The next day, the wives of other ranch workers came by the Snchez Robles house, looking for their missing spouses. In Coahuila we were hearing the word being passed from municipality to municipality, about a large scale Zeta massacre in several towns of "The Five Springs", (Los Cinco Manantiales) including Allende. The human rights exception applies even to records from an ongoing criminal investigation, the kinds of files normally only accessible through high-profile leaks, such as the Panama Papers, or in piecemeal fashion and after lengthy delays through access to information laws. To date, only a handful of Zetas and corrupt police officials have been convicted in a case that involves dozens of crime scenes, hundreds of victims, and the documented participation of numerous Zetas and public officials. Washington, D.C., March 18, 2021 - Ten years ago, the Mexican municipality of Allende was the site of one of the worst human rights atrocities ever seen in the country: a three-day wave of violence in which the criminal group known as Los Zetas kidnapped, murdered, and later burned the bodies of an estimated 300 . A fire department volunteer described the scene as they approached. The missing from the Allende massacre are among the 13,000 the . See Allende, el infierno: Los testigos de la masacre, Zcalo (Coahuila), July 10, 2017. The wife of another victim, a heavy machinery mechanic who worked for the Garza family, also went looking for her husband on the morning of the March 19. And that if we didn't obey, they were going to fuck us and our families. This article was posted in Borderland Beat mainpage on March 26, 2011. In June 2019, more than eight years after the fact, President Lpez Obradorapologizedfor the Mexican governments ineffective response to the assault on Allende, pinning most of the blame on narcotraffickers but also recommitting his government to implementing the March 2018CNDH recommendations, which included punishing government agents who facilitated or failed to react to the violence. U.S. Prosecutions Bring Mexico Corruption into Focus The series, called Somos., which means "we are," was . Some of those interviewed during the investigation said the rampage started as an act of revenge by top Zetas leaders against Cuellar, Junior, and other deputies, who they accused of pocketing millions of dollars in stolen drug money. Peering through the gates, the firefighters saw members of the Los Zetas criminal group berating and beating members of the Garza family, who owned the ranch, along with several of their employees. And as I am originally from here in Allende, and this is a small town, for this reason I know these people. A self-described foca (lookout) for the Zetas, he had been found sleeping on the job. There were other people in civilian clothes who carried long arms, and these people were Los Zetas, since I realized that there at the [Garza] ranch were [El Pala,] whose name is [Fernando Ros Bustos]; [El Canelo,] whose name is [Germn Zaragoza Snchez]; [El Cubano], whose name is [Juan Rafael Arredondo Oviedo]; [El Pjaro], whose name is [Jos Alfredo Jimnez Aguilar]; [El Flacaman,] whose name is [Gabriel Zaragoza Snchez,] among other people, some of whom I did not know, but they seemed to be from the south since they wore sandals and carried machetes.

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