Retired judge arrested over 2014 disappearance of 43 students in Mexico
Over a decade after 43 students from a rural teaching college vanished in southern Mexico, a new arrest has stirred fresh scrutiny and reopened old wounds. On Thursday, Mexican authorities detained now-retired judge, 79-year-old Lambertina Galeana Marín, over missing evidence in the case.
The arrest is related to the 'disappearance of recordings from cameras' placed in the Palace of Justice in Iguala, in the Mexican State of Guerrero, where the students were last seen.
Marín served as the president of the Superior Court of Justice of Guerrero at the time of the case. Arrest warrants were issued in August of 2022 for military commanders, police officers, and 'five administrative and judicial authorities from the state of Guerrero,' though at the time, the Attorney General's Office (FGR) did not identify the individuals allegedly involved.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum spoke about Marin's arrest in Friday morning press conference. She said that the special prosecutor's office is investigating why videos related to the case were erased, an issue she noted families of those who disappeared in 2014 have been raising for a long time.
Sheinbaum replaced Andrés Manuel López Obrador in 2024, who left the presidency without fulfilling a key pledge to uncover the truth regarding the 2014 disappearances of 43 students.
The case of the missing students has long gripped Mexico. The students, all males at the local Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College, were traveling through the southwestern city of Iguala on September 26, 2014 when their bus was stopped by local police and military forces. Exactly what transpired after that interaction is still unknown, but photos from the scene show a bullet-riddled bus.
A government report from 2022 concluded that the vanished students were victims of 'state sponsored crime.' In 2023, a report from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Mexico found that Mexico's Armed Forces did not provide all the information requested by an independent panel investigating the disappearance. That same year, experts on that panel looking into the case quit, citing 'lack of information,' 'secrecy' and 'hidden evidence' surrounding their investigative efforts.
For grieving families, the arrest reinforces suspicions of a possible cover-up related to the 2014 disappearances. Felipe de la Cruz, one of the Ayotzinapa parents and spokesperson for the group of parents of the disappeared, told CNN on Thursday that a 'pact of silence continues to reign' in the area.
'For us, it is very important that first of all, the investigation continues, and that work continues to be done,' de la Cruz added.
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