Weekly Report - 06 December 2005

The DVD, made in May, was put up on the website of the Dallas Morning News on 1 December. The victims on display 'confessed' to involvement in the 5 April murder of journalist Guadalupe Garcí­a Escamilla and the planning of the later (8 June) murder of Nuevo Laredo director of public security Alejandro Domí­nguez [WR-05-23]. They also said they collaborated with members of the police and sought to recruit members of the military and federal agents.

No sooner was the news out than José Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, deputy chief prosecutor in charge of organised crime, said the authorities had been aware of the DVD for 'months' (since May, actually) and had arrested 10 people, including eight AFI agents, suspected of being the culprits and of having been hired by the Beltrán Leyva faction of the Sinaloa cartel. His information was outdated: five of the three AFI agents had been released in September for lack of evidence. On 4 December chief prosecutor Daniel Cabeza de Vaca said there was insufficient evidence to blame the AFI agents and that in any case they could not be charged with torture as they had acted privately, on their own time.

 

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