By Maria Verza -
The Associated Press
When a fire broke out last month at a migrant detention center on the Ciudad Juárez border in Mexico,
differing reactions among those guarding the men and women made the difference between life and death
, according to new videos from surveillance and witness statements seen by The Associated Press.
Forty men died of suffocation by the fire started by one of the migrants and thirty were injured.
The 15 women who were detained in the same facility were able to get out safely when the smoke began to reach their bedrooms.
In one part of the recordings, hours before the fire on March 27, private security guards open and close the men's cell to bring jugs of water and allow access for cleaning personnel.
However, when the fire started, no one tried to open that gate despite the presence of workers on the scene.
Staff members of the migrant center in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, walk past the cell where 68 men were being held as a fire breaks out, on March 27, 2023.Noticias Telemundo
Meanwhile, in another part of the building, a security guard ran to the women's dormitories to release them with keys that, according to what she declared, had been given to her by the migration agent in charge of the women's wing, Gloria Liliana Ramos, one of the officials prosecuted. for homicide.
There were 16 security cameras
The images are part of the recordings of the 16 security cameras that were in the facilities and that collected many movements of that day but do not clarify the great unknown that still remains to be resolved: where were the keys to the
men's cell when the attack began? fire?
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More than three weeks after the worst event of these characteristics that Mexico has experienced, seven people are being prosecuted for homicide and injuries: five officials from the National Institute of Migration (INM), the migrant who allegedly set mattresses on fire, which caused the fire, and a private security guard.
The Prosecutor's Office is investigating Garduño for breaching his responsibility to protect migrants, and retired Rear Admiral Salvador González, for homicide, as head of the immigration agency in the state of Chihuahua, where Ciudad Juárez is located.
Friday's hearing against Garduño was suspended until Tuesday, after his defense argued that he had not had access to the case file.
One of his lieutenants, Antonio Molina, the verification director of the migration agency, also faced charges for the failure to guarantee decent conditions for migrants.
The prosecutor pointed out that the night of the fire there were 16 of the 68 migrants locked up who had not even been noted in the registry.
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It also investigates possible acts of corruption linked to the contract of the migration agency with the private security company that guarded the detention center and misdemeanors of the INM that, according to their investigations, "indicate a pattern of irresponsibility and omissions that has been repeated" during years.
The government promised a strong hand
The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has promised that there will be no impunity and the countries of origin of the migrants – most of them Central American or Venezuelan – demanded a transparent investigation to find those responsible up to the highest level.
The US Attorney's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the videos or witness statements made available to The Associated Press through a defense attorney.
On the night of the fire, a small group of male migrants had placed mats against the bars to block the view inside, disconnected the cameras and set mattresses on fire in protest.
Interior of the Ciudad Juárez immigration center, hours before the fire on March 27, 2023.Noticias Telemundo
In the recording made public just after the fire, some of them are seen talking to the guards who approached the bars, then walking away without trying to open the cell.
Within minutes, smoke had filled everything.
The immigration agent Rodolfo Collazo, another of the defendants, acknowledged being in charge of the keys in the men's area
that night, but shortly before the fire he had gone out to transfer two minors to another center.
According to his statement, he left the supervisor of the private security company in charge and the keys hung on the office wall.
His partner, Ramos, agreed that the private guards remained responsible.
According to an expert opinion prepared by Luis Fermín Cal y Mayor, at the request of the defense of another of the prosecuted officials, presented before the courthouse on Tuesday with screenshots of the videos, the keys were in the possession of the workers of the private company until minutes before the fire.
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They denied it.
In their statements before the Public Ministry, they explained that just before the fire started, they had gone to the bathroom to fill a jug because the migrants were asking for water.
It began to "smell very bad"
When the smoke began to spread, the private security guard Angélica Hinojosa, assigned to the women's section, ran out and shortly after she was seen followed by a member of the National Guard.
In her testimony, she explained that when she began "to smell very ugly" and to notice the smoke, she asked Ramos, the woman in charge of them, for the keys to the women's area.
The official said that she helped Hinojosa to evict the 15 migrants
and that she called both the emergency services and one of the managers of the facilities, who is also under trial.
Two Venezuelan sisters comfort each other Tuesday, March 28, 2023, in front of the detention center in Ciudad Juárez, where the fire broke out.AP
The migrants, some covering their noses and mouths from the smoke, ran out of the place.
In their official statements, they mentioned hearing shouts from the men, some asking for water, and voices asking where the keys to the cell were.
They question charges against officials
Ramos' lawyer, Aglaeth González, explained to the Associated Press that the official should not be prosecuted because
she helped save lives
.
She added that on Thursday she had not yet had access to the surveillance videos and that it was being very difficult to interview immigration officials because they feared reprisals if they spoke to her.
Lawyers for some of the officials questioned that charges were filed without thoroughly analyzing the tens of hours of videos from the detention center.
Collazo's daughter, Tania Collazo, said she fears her father is not being given a fair trial because of the need to find guilty quickly.
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When the official returned after the transfer of the children, the smoke was already unbearable.
He says that he tried to get in for the keys but couldn't.
According to one of the security guards, it was his fellow security guard – currently on trial – who did it and located them on a desk.
That second guard was the one who was able to open a back door but not another inner one that was closed.
["This fire is the result of the pressure cooker that Juárez has turned into on the immigration issue," experts denounce]
The place did not have emergency exits
, their workers assured, but they did have fire extinguishers that were worthless.
Rescue teams could only begin to remove bodies and survivors when firefighters blew a hole in a wall of the facility a few steps from the river that separates Mexico from the United States.
