(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 6 August 2001 IAPA press release: IAPA voices surprise and concern over acquittal in Philip True murder case in Mexico MIAMI, Florida (August 6, 2001) — The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today expressed surprise and concern at the acquittal by a court in Mexico of two defendants who […]
(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 6 August 2001 IAPA press release:
IAPA voices surprise and concern over acquittal in Philip True murder case in Mexico
MIAMI, Florida (August 6, 2001) — The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today expressed surprise and concern at the acquittal by a court in Mexico of two defendants who confessed to murdering American journalist Philip True in 1998.
True, correspondent in Mexico for the San Antonio Express-News, San Antonio, Texas, since 1992, traveled in late November 1998 to a rural area in the Sierra Madre mountains in western Mexico to report on the Huichol Indians there. He was found dead on December 16 and two Huichol men were said, by police, to have confessed to taking part in his murder.
The IAPA sent the following note to Mexican Attorney General Rafael Macedo de la Concha, signed by its president, Danilo Arbilla, editor of the Montevideo, Uruguay, news weekly Búsqueda (full text):
“The Inter American Press Association expresses its surprise and concern on learning of the release, last Friday, of the confessed killers of journalist Philip True, Mexico correspondent of the San Antonio Express-News, after a municipal judge in Jalisco state acquitted them of the charges brought against them.
The investigation and legal process from the outset was full of irregularities that prevented those who carried out the murder from being held responsible for the crime they committed and we are surprised that Judge José Luis Reyes has ruled in favor of the defendants after they had confessed to committing the crime and True’s belongings had been found in their homes.
Mr. Attorney General, we are also concerned over the fact that by going to any lengths to free the accused, the memory of True is dishonored, attempting to insinuate that he had been drinking alcohol which might have caused him to stumble accidentally and thus cause his death. It is also strange and unusual that three autopsies were carried out, each one producing different findings.
The Inter American Press Association, an organization representing more than 1,300 publications throughout the Western Hemisphere, regrets the court ruling and considers that on this occasion the justice system ignored convincing factors that would have made this case an example of the authorities’ interest in solving dozens of crimes against journalists that still remain unpunished.
We once again raise the petition that an IAPA delegation made during a visit with President Vicente Fox in February in Mexico City, in which we urged him to pay greater attention to the number of crimes against journalists and that such cases be transferred to federal jurisdiction in order to ensure an impartial process.
We similarly wish to invoke Principle 4 of the Declaration of Chapultepec, which stresses that ‘freedom of expression and of the press are severely limited by murder, terrorism, kidnapping, … violence of any kind and impunity for perpetrators. These acts must be investigated promptly and punished harshly.'”
