Soldiers Indicted in Civilian Court for Disappearance and Murder of Seven Mexican Civilians Gustavo Castillo Garcia - La Jornada
go to original August 2, 2015

Related: Mexico Military Possibly Linked to Disappearance of Ayotzinapa Students (teleSUR English)

A District Court Judge specialized in the new ('adversarial') criminal justice system issued an order of attachment to criminal justice proceedings [indictment] against four soldiers from the 97th Infantry Battalion with the 11th Military Zone based in Guadalupe, Zacatecas. In issuing the order, the Judge considered that there is evidence for them to be tried for the crime of forced disappearance of persons and intentional homicide against seven civilians.

The victims, seven young people, were taken from their home and then allegedly murdered by soldiers from the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA).

The Federal Judiciary Council (CJF) announced that the crime of murder is seen as one in which preventive detention is applied de oficio, such that the trial judge ordered that the four accused military personnel in this criminal proceeding be imprisoned for the duration of the legal process until the relevant judgment [guilt or innocence] is handed down.

The seven youths disappeared in the predawn hours after soldiers from the 97th Infantry Battalion violently removed them from the house at 106 Francisco I. Madero Street in the city of Calera, Zacatecas.

Read the rest at Mexico Voices

Related: Mexico Drug War: Need to Legally Define Military Functions in Public Security (Mexico Voices)

Photo: The New Yorker

Mexico Voices is a blogging endeavor aimed at raising the awareness of U.S. citizens regarding the destructive impact of the U.S. economic policy and the War on Drugs on Mexico — on its people, their economic and physical security and their human rights, on the nation’s dysfunctional justice system, and on the rule of law and Mexico’s fragile democracy. Visit the website at MexicoVoices.blogspot.mx

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