(CENCOS/IFEX) – A court in the southeastern state of Quintana Roo has closed the investigation into the case of journalist Lydia Cacho Ribeiro. The court rejected the request for arrest warrants to be served to public officials and former public servants of the state of Puebla, accused of involvement in the torture of the journalist. […]
(CENCOS/IFEX) – A court in the southeastern state of Quintana Roo has closed the investigation into the case of journalist Lydia Cacho Ribeiro. The court rejected the request for arrest warrants to be served to public officials and former public servants of the state of Puebla, accused of involvement in the torture of the journalist.
In his decision, Judge Benjamín Navarrete argued that he could not facilitate the detention of the public servants in question because his court only has jurisdiction over public officials in the state of Quintana Roo; the jurisdiction of his court does not extent into other states, such as Puebla. With this decision, a new obstacle has been thrown up by the legal system to complicate Cacho Ribeiro’s pursuit of justice.
The remand from the Attorney General’s Office (Procuraduría General de la República) requested that the Quintana Roo judge issue warrants for the arrest of various public servants of Puebla state, including the former attorney general, a minister, a police commander and various criminal justice system officials, who allegedly produced falsified paperwork to facilitate Cacho Ribeiro’s detention.
Cacho Ribeiro was illegally detained in December 2005, in reprisal for the publication of her book “Los Demonios del Edén”, which exposed the existence of a pedophile ring and implicated various influential individuals, including US citizen Jean Succar Kuri and textile magnate Kamel Nacif. Video footage was also leaked to the media implicating Puebla state governor Mario Marín in Cacho Ribeiro’s detention.
In December 2005, Cacho Ribeiro was taken into custody in Quintana Roo by Puebla state authorities, who then drove her to Puebla state where she was confronted with a defamation suit filed by Nacif.
In reward for her courageous investigation into pedophile rings, Cacho Ribeiro’s rights to due process and free expression have been flouted. The failure of the legal system in her case serves to highlight the triumph of impunity in Mexico, and to expose the arbitrary abuse of power by some government authorities.
Updates the Cacho Ribeiro case: http://ifex.org/en/content/view/full/92874
