Mexico's former prosecutor, Jesús Murillo Karam, was arrested this Friday in the Aztec capital for the disappearance of the 43 students of Ayotzinapa in 2014. The so-called Truth Commission, created by the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to carry out the investigation, concluded that the events constituted a "State crime".
#FGRInforma | La #FGR, cumplimentó orden de aprehensión en contra Jesús “M”, por la probable comisión de los delitos de desaparición forzada, tortura y contra la administración de justicia, en el caso Ayotzinapa. ➡️ https://t.co/UEaTUCsvZe
— FGR México (@FGRMexico) August 19, 2022
Jesús Murillo Kram is charged with "forced disappearance, torture and crimes against the administration of justice." The official who led the first investigation into the disappearances during the government of Enrique Peña Nieto, concluded that corrupt police detained the students and handed them over to the Guerreros Unidos cartel, which then murdered them, and finally incinerated them in a garbage dump in the town of Cocula. According to this version, the criminals also allegedly dumped the remains in the San Juan River, having mistaken them for members of a rival gang. They were only able to identify the remains of three of the victims.
The new official report published last Thursday by the current government, estimated that Mexican soldiers were partly responsible for the crime and that "their actions, omission or participation, allowed the disappearance and execution of the students, as well as the murder of six other people", the details of the events were given by the undersecretary of Human Rights of the Mexican government, Alejandro Encinas, in a press conference.
El Informe de la Presidencia de la Comisión para la Verdad y Acceso a la Justicia del Caso Ayotzinapa se lee en conjunto con sus ocho anexos.
Consúltalos aquí👇🏻https://t.co/ia4BGEcdPH pic.twitter.com/l9boPH7yPY
— Alejandro Encinas (@A_Encinas_R) August 21, 2022
Mexican President López Obrador stated in a press conference in Tijuana on Friday that the case "is not closed" and that "this atrocious and inhumane situation must be made public and, at the same time, we must punish those responsible to prevent these unfortunate events from ever happening again."
Ayotzinapa students
On September 26, 2014, a group of students from the school for rural teachers in Ayotzinapa, in the state of Guerrero, disappeared while on their way to Mexico City to participate in a demonstration for October 2, when the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre is commemorated.
The relatives of the victims have never agreed with the official version offered by Jesús Murillo Kram.
There are several defendants accused of the facts
Mexico's Attorney General's Office also announced that arrest warrants have been issued for 20 army officers, 44 police officers and five civil servants for their alleged involvement in the disappearance of the Ayotzinapa students. The officers are wanted for "organized crime, forced disappearance, torture, homicide and crimes against the administration of justice," said the official body, which has decided not to release the identities and rank of those charged for the time being. The arrest of 14 members of the Guerreros Unidos drug cartel has also been ordered.
