Judge Orders New Federal Probe in 2014 Killings by Soldiers in Tlatlaya The Associated Press
go to original August 16, 2017

Warning: This 2014 report contains graphic images which some viewers may find disturbing. (Al Jazeera English)

A Mexican judge has ordered federal authorities to investigate whether army commanders played any role in the killing by soldiers of 22 suspected criminals at a warehouse three years ago, a case that became one of the country’s biggest scandals over allegations of human rights abuse.

The ruling said the federal Attorney General’s Office did not investigate a purported military order issued before the incident in which soldiers were urged to “shoot down criminals in hours of obscurity.” The federal judge’s ruling was issued Aug. 1, but did not become public until Tuesday.

The government’s human rights agency charged that at least a dozen and as many as 15 of the suspects were executed after surrendering to an army patrol following a June 2014 gunbattle in the central town of Tlatlaya, west of Mexico City. Army authorities initially claimed all 22 people were killed during a firefight they began by firing on soldiers.

Seven soldiers were accused of homicide, but civilian courts eventually threw out the charges against all of them.

The latest ruling came in a complaint filed by one of three women who survived the bloodshed and later charged that agents of the Mexico State prosecutor’s office tortured them into supporting the army’s version of events.

The decision says the federal Attorney General’s Office “has not diligently conducted any diverse investigation into the facts or the orders issued to military elements through the chain of command.”

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