For a map, click here. For a map of Durango state, click here.To read the Rantburg.com report on the abduction and murder of Ramiro Ortiz Aguirre click here
By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com
The Durango state Fiscalia General del Estado (FGE) or attorney general told an assembly of the state Chamber of Deputies that she takes responsibility for pulling the security detail only hours before her predecessor was kidnapped and murdered, according to Mexican news accounts
Sonia Yadira de la Garza Fragoso appeared last Friday before a session of the Durango state Chamber of Deputies to give a report on her department, following what she says is a final account of one of the worst mass graves in modern Mexican history.
Her predecessor, Ramiro Ortiz Aguirre, was kidnapped last March 28th near a shopping center in Durango city. He was later found shot to death near the village of Estacion El Chorro.
News accounts at the time of the discovery of the body mentioned Ortiz Aguirre's personal state-provided security detail had been mysteriously pulled only hours before he was abducted and later murdered. Those accounts failed to mention how or why the detail had been pulled.
In her presentation to Durango legislators, she did not elaborate her reasons for pulling the detail and stopped short of saying she personally ordered it pulled.
It was during the term of Ortiz Aguirre in April 2011 when the first of 331 dead were exhumed mostly around Durango city, but he resigned in June 2011 before he completed his concurrent term.
Exhumations continued throughout 2011 with the help of Mexican federal security forces, mainly Mexican Army units. The exhumations were completed in
In her presentation, Yadira de la Garza Fragoso broke down the grim statistics of the mass graves.
- 331 individuals were found in total.
- Of those, 303 were male, 22 were female, and the rest were unidentifiable.
- Of the 13 graves uncovered, eight were found in Durango city totalling 301 dead. This total eclipses by 108 dead the mass graves uncovered in San Fernando municipality in Nuevo Leon the same spring-summer of 2011.
- In Lerdo municipality two mass graves were uncovered with a total of 10 dead, six of whom have already been identified. Seven suspects were detained in connection with those dead.
- In San Juan del Rio municipality nine dead were also found, one of whom was identified.
- In Santiago Papasquiaro municipality eight dead were found, but none have been identified.
- In Cuencame municipality three dead were found. Three suspects have been detained in connection with that grave.
- 258 were killed by strangulation
- 17 were killed by gunshot.
- 15 were killed by suffocation.
- Seven were beaten to death.
- 34 died from indeterminate causes.
When I go it's gonna be from indeterminate causes. It's so much more pleasant than being beaten to death...
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com