• OUTRAGE The release from prison of one of the main suspects in the 2014 disappearance of 43 students triggered accusations against Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office due to what is seen as a badly prepared prosecution including fabricating evidence and obtaining testimonies using torture.
• THE MAN According to Mexican authorities, Gildardo López Astudillo, aka “El Gil”, was the head of the drug trafficking gang known as “Guerreros Unidos” to which corrupt police officers from the town of Iguala in Guerrero state (pop. 3.5 million) transferred the 43 students after being detained.
• QUOTE: “It’s worrisome that (prosecutors) cannot support indictments. We have confirmed that the deficiency in the arrests, in how prosecutions are supported and how this has is consequence of why these releases (of suspects) are happening”, says Luis Raúl González Pérez, head of Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission.
• BOTCHED INVESTIGATION Considered one of the most emblematic human rights abuse cases in recent years, the Ayotzinapa case (the name the disappeared students college) has been full with irregularities that have ended in the release of 53 of 143 original suspects, per Mexico’s Government.
