Government Rejects Findings Against Investigators of 43 Missing Students Paulina Villegas and Elisabeth Malkin - The New York Times
go to original February 13, 2017

More than two years after 43 students disappeared from Ayotzinapa in Mexico, their loved ones still seek justice and closure. (Field of Vision)

The final version of an internal review by the Mexican government into the conduct of investigators searching for 43 missing students has rejected an earlier report that found that the officials’ mishandling of suspects and evidence broke the law.

The original review described such serious wrongdoing, beginning with the illegal arrest of key suspects, that it threatened the foundations of the government’s legal case. The new review, led by a different official, wiped clean the most damning of those violations, leaving the government’s version of the case intact.

The investigators’ actions amounted only to technical violations, according to the new report, which was prepared by the inspector general of the attorney general’s office and given to the students’ families Thursday.

The final report is “a clear example that they are covering up and diluting” investigators’ responsibilities, said Mario Patrón, director of the Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez Human Rights Center in Mexico City and the families’ legal representative.

“We feel the government’s priority is no longer finding the truth about what happened to the students, but is much more concerned with hiding the reasons behind a historical cover-up,” Patrón added.

The students’ disappearance has shaken the government of President Enrique Peña Nieto, becoming emblematic of Mexico’s inability to provide security to its citizens and its failure to confront the corruption that riddles law enforcement.

Outside experts have repeatedly raised questions about the government’s handling of the investigation in the weeks after the students vanished in September 2014, prompting the internal review.

The first version was completed in August but was never approved by the attorney general. It was obtained by The New York Times in December.

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