2022, a lethal year against the press in Mexico 3:48
(CNN Spanish) --
The violence against the press in Mexico does not let up and in eight months, so far in 2022, 13 journalists have been murdered in the country, according to the count of organizations such as Article 19, Reporters Without Borders (RSF ), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and the one recorded by CNN.
The Latin American country is considered one of the deadliest to practice journalism.
This year the statistics were exceeded and 2022 has become the deadliest for the press, compared to 2017 when 12 murders of journalists were recorded throughout the year, according to data from Article 19, an organization that defends freedom of expression with performance in Mexico and other countries in the region that began counting from 2000.
The most recent case is that of journalist Ernesto Méndez, who was killed when an armed commando broke into a bar he owned and attacked him, and became part of a list that has been growing more and more causing indignation and anxiety among the guild
Why is the mechanism to protect journalists in Mexico failing?
Although a protection mechanism for the press has been implemented in the country since 2012, it is overwhelmed by the violence they suffer.
Between the wave of violence that is plaguing Mexico, the lack of resources and training for those who assess the risk to journalists, and the high levels of impunity, it will be difficult for the attacks to stop, Pedro Cárdenas Casillas, coordinator of Documentation and Follow-up of cases in the area of Protection of Article 19 in Mexico and Central America, in January.
"There is no protection mechanism that can only fight violence if it is not investigated," he said.
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According to RSF, Méndez is the thirteenth journalist to be killed in Mexico in 2022, of which at least nine are directly related to his professional activity.
This is the list of journalists who have been murdered so far in 2022.
13. Ernesto Mendez
Ernesto Méndez was director of the digital medium Tu Voz, a space that covers political, social and cultural information in the region of the state of Guanajuato, in central Mexico.
He was killed when an armed commando broke into a bar he owned and attacked him, Article 19 reported. The Guanajuato government reported the death of two other people in the attack.
Article 19 confirmed to CNN that Méndez had a history of threats, so the organization called the Special Prosecutor for Crimes Committed against Freedom of Expression (Feadle) to attract the case and consider it as one of the lines of investigation. his informative work as a possible motive for the murder.
In a message on Twitter, the governor of Guanajuato, Diego Sinhue Rodríguez, condemned Méndez's crime and said that he has instructed the state government secretary to provide support to the family and to follow up on the case promptly.
CNN has tried to contact the Guanajuato State Prosecutor's Office, but so far we have not received a response.
12. Anthony of the Cross
Journalist Antonio de la Cruz was shot dead on Wednesday, June 29, in Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas, northwestern Mexico.
He had just left his house in his car when a person on a motorcycle approached and opened fire on him, according to local media
Expreso.
press
, for which he was a reporter for more than 23 years.
His 23-year-old daughter accompanied him and was injured.
De la Cruz covered issues related to the agri-food industry and was a journalist "very critical" of the authorities, Miguel Domínguez, editor of Expreso
, told RSF .
In addition, Domínguez said, he was very active on social networks where he dealt with issues related to security and politics in the region.
"We have said it so many times that it might seem idle, but today we want it to be heard louder than ever: all of us who make up the Grupo Editorial Expreso-La Razón demand that justice be done, that the crime of our friend does not go unpunished like many others ", wrote the newspaper in an editorial the next day.
The Tamaulipas State Attorney General's Office launched an investigation into the journalist's death, which will be investigated by the Specialized Unit for the Investigation of Crimes Committed against Freedom of Expression, Human Rights and Vulnerable Groups.
Mexican journalist Antonio de la Cruz is murdered 1:38
11. Yessenia Mollinedo Falconi
Yessenia Mollinedo was the director of
El Veraz,
a local media outlet in Cosoleacaque, Veracruz, which reported on local news, politics, and crime-related issues in the state's coastal area through its Facebook page, according to RSF.
Mollinedo was shot to death on Monday, May 9, when she was in her car, along with her colleague Sheila Johana García Olivera, outside a supermarket in Cosoleacaque.
Ramiro Mollinedo, Yesenia's older brother and also a journalist, told the
Corriente Alterna
digital newspaper that his sister had received anonymous threats by phone two weeks before her murder.
"They told him not to mess with the police (information)," said her brother.
Journalist in Veracruz: Why so much hate?
3:42
10. Sheila Johana Garcia Olivera
Sheila Johana García Olivera had joined
El Veraz
as a journalist and camerawoman for six months when she died in hospital from gunshot wounds hours after individuals on a motorcycle shot her and her colleague Yessenia Mollinedo while they were waiting. inside his car that was parked in a supermarket in Cosoleacaque, according to RSF.
The Veracruz State Prosecutor's Office released more than a month ago the person who had been detained in connection with the death of the director of the El Veraz portal and the reporter Sheila Johana García Olivera.
According to the authorities, it was a mistake by homonymy, or same name.
Three journalists killed in Mexico in the last week, according to authorities
9. Luis Enrique Ramirez Ramos
The same week that Mollinedo and García Olivera were assassinated, another journalist was found dead in Sinaloa.
The state prosecutor, Sara Quiñonez, reported on May 5 that the lifeless body of journalist Luis Enrique Ramírez had been found.
According to RSF, Ramírez's body was "wrapped in plastic on the side of a road in the south of Culiacán, the capital of Sinaloa.
Ramírez was a columnist and founder of the news portal ''Fuentes Fidedignas''.
The media reported that he was killed that day in the afternoon and that his body was found after being kidnapped in an area near his house.
It is unknown if Ramírez's murder was related to his professional activities.
8. Armando Linares Lopez
A month and a half after his collaborator Roberto Toledo was killed, journalist Armando Linares was murdered on March 15 at his home in Zitácuaro, Michoacán.
According to the State Attorney General's Office, the body had "wounds caused by a firearm shot" and reported that it would initiate an investigation to clarify the facts "in accordance with the Approved Protocol for the Investigation of Crimes Committed Against Freedom of Expression."
Linares López was the director of Monitor Michoacán and when Toledo was murdered at the beginning of the year he told RSF that the outlet had already received anonymous threats by phone for months.
“We are not armed, we do not bring weapons.
Our only defense is a pen, a notebook, ”said Linares when denouncing the murder of his partner Roberto Toledo.
7. Juan Carlos Muniz
Journalist Juan Carlos Muñiz was assassinated on March 4 in Fresnillo, Zacatecas.
"The cowardly murder of our colleague and friend has shocked a large part of Fresnillian society and the state, as well as the journalistic guild," confirmed this by
Mining Witness,
the media outlet for which he worked, and asked the Prosecutor's Office to investigate the crime .
In his reports, Muñiz used to sign his work under the pseudonym “Rigoberto or TX”, since he also made a living as a taxi driver, according to a
Mining Witness publication.
The Zacatecas Prosecutor's Office then assured that an investigation had been opened to clarify the murder of the reporter and that it had opened direct communication with the Mechanism for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists of the Ministry of the Interior.
Zacatecas Prosecutor Confirms Murder of Journalist 0:55
6. Jorge Luis Camero Zazueta
Jorge Luis Camero Zazueta was "murdered with a firearm" on February 24, 2022 in Empalme, Sonora, inside a gym, according to the Sonora Attorney General's Office, which launched an investigation into what happened.
Days after the crime, the Sonora prosecutor's office and the Secretary of State Security indicated that they investigated the media's fan page.
"It is not, so far in what we have carried out in the investigation, that freedom of expression can constitute a line. Definitely not. This is related, rather, to drug dealing crimes," the authorities said in a statement.
Camero Zazueta was director of the Facebook portal "El Informativo", where he reported on security and justice in the municipality.
"He had a double role as personal assistant to the Municipal President, Luis Fuentes Aguilar. However, on February 9 he requested a license from the Empalme City Council and continued with his journalistic activity," says Article 19.
Inter American Press Association condemns attacks on journalists in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador
5. Heber Lopez Vasquez
Heber López Vásquez was assassinated in Salina Cruz, Oaxaca, on February 10, reported Ricardo Mejía, Mexico's Undersecretary for Security.
He worked for the RCP Noticias site, which confirmed through its social networks that the journalist was murdered inside his recording studio.
"We are dismayed," the outlet wrote.
López Vásquez was also the founder and director of Noticias Web, broadcast through Facebook, where he "regularly and vehemently criticized the actions of the local political class, especially those of the municipality of Salina Cruz," according to RSF.
Less than 24 hours after the crime, the Oaxacan Prosecutor's Office reported that they arrested two suspects for the murder of López Vásquez.
4. Robert Toledo
Roberto Toledo, a member of the team of the local news portal Monitor Michoacán, died on January 31 from gunshot wounds in the town of Zitácuaro.
Then, the municipal government of Zitácuaro indicated that Toledo was attacked by three individuals in the law firm where he worked as a technical collaborator.
After hearing the news, the general coordinator of Social Communication of the Presidency of Mexico, Jesús Ramírez, condemned the murder of Toledo and assured that "we will not allow impunity" in the case.
However, hours later, Ramírez gave a different version of the same event, pointing out that "according to judicial investigations" Toledo worked as an assistant to a law firm, "not as a journalist."
This, despite the fact that the publication's director, Armando Linares, referred to Toledo as a member of the Monitor Michoacán team.
Three articles signed by Toledo are available on the site, the most recent of them from November 2021.
Vivir Quintana launches song in defense of press freedom 2:32
3. Lourdes Maldonado Lopez
"I fear for my life," those were the words that journalist Lourdes Maldonado López told President Andrés Manuel López Obrador three years ago during a press conference.
On January 24, she was murdered in her car in the city of Tijuana, Baja California, state authorities reported.
Maldonado López had requested protection measures against the threats received for the work he was doing, so he had police patrols for his safety, Pedro Cárdenas Casillas, coordinator of Documentation and Follow-up of cases of the Article 19 Protection area in Mexico, told CNN. and Central America, last January.
Weeks after his murder, three people were arrested in connection with the case.
"Progress has been made in clarifying this crime, it was a joint effort by the federal government and the essential participation of the government of the state of Baja California," President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said at the time.
Journalists in Mexico raise their voices again for justice 2:37
2. Margarito Martinez
Photojournalist Margarito Martínez covered police and security issues for the weekly Zeta and other local media in Tijuana, Baja California.
On January 17, he was shot several times in front of his house.
Martínez belonged to a small but well-known group of independent journalists who documented crime in Tijuana.
Jesús Aguilar, a journalist from Tijuana who covers crime and one of Martínez's best friends, was there to document the events.
“That's what we do, we cover homicides.
Now I witnessed his," he told CNN last June.
"He didn't investigate anything," Aguilar said.
“Other journalists investigate these crimes but Margarito only reported basic facts.
He didn't deserve what happened,” he said.
Ten people with connections to organized crime were detained by Mexican authorities in connection with Martinez's death.
But several of them were eventually released and none have been formally charged.
Anxiety and anger take over the press in Mexico after wave of murders of journalists
1. Jose Luis Gamboa Arenas
On January 10, the body of José Luis Gamboa was found in the Floresta subdivision, in the city of Veracruz.
The journalist had at least seven stab wounds, according to local media and what Israel Hernández, executive secretary of the State Commission for the Care and Protection of Journalists (CEAPP) in Veracruz, told CPJ.
According to Article 19, Gamboa was an independent journalist and director of the "Inforegio Network" Facebook page, in which he covered politics and alleged links between the authorities and organized crime groups, as well as the state of insecurity. .
With information from Juan Carlos Paz, George Engels, Karol Suárez, Ana Cucalón, Abel Alvarado, Belén Zapata, Fernando Almánzar and Matt Rivers from CNN
Murdered journalistsViolence Mexico