AUTOEXILIO (SELF)EXILE)
THE SICARIO
April 2010
For a long time I have watched with sadness that the reality of Mexico and Mexicans is to endure all of the errors committed on a continuing basis by the political leaders of this country. I wonder what would have become of me and my family if in some moment of desperation I had decided not to abandon Mexico and the small amount of money and property that I had there. Let me tell you:
A certain commander told me back in those years, “Trust us. We are the only ones who can defend you with your declaration. We will clarify some cases, and you are a witness, and if you do not do it, we will be able to arrest you and accuse you of complicity.”
Disgracefully, desgraciadamente, I trusted him, and less than four hours later the woman who at that time was my partner was injured, she was raped and gasoline was poured on her, and though she survived, she was left in this condition as a very clear message to me. At that time, I decided to hide in a distant state in Mexico and cut all connections to friends and family and to forget them. At that time, I then began to work honestly, day after day, until I was able to save a small amount of money that gave me the solvency I needed to be able to move on, to get ahead.
I did not have much, but the little that I had was enough to live well. I met a beautiful person, and after some time passed, we decided to get married, and in order to do this legally, I had to give precise information about my date of birth and address to the justice of the peace [civil registry] where we got married. They found me in less than three days, and sadly, disgracefully, this is when I realized the extent to which the Mexican government was infiltrated by the dirty business of trade in weapons and drugs. That is when I realized that they had a video of my face, that they could find me and identify me even when I had only given general information to the civil registry so that I could get married. But that was enough for them to find me. Could it be that the criminals have better operational systems than the government? Or that the operational systems of the country are at the disposal of the narcos who are working for them?
I made the decision then to approach a certain person and tell him what was happening to me. To do this, I had to move again with all of my family. Now it was not just my life that was in danger, but also the life of the woman I had just married.
I told this person that I had decided to ask for help, and he gave me some good advice. I tried at that moment to seek protection from the federal government, but unfortunately, things were even worse than in the first instance. The federal authorities had given themselves the job of ransacking houses and detaining people linked to narco-trafficking and smuggling. These people were being bought off, and not satisfied with that, they gave the criminals my description and told them that it was me who had given the authorities the necessary information for their arrest and detention. I should mention that I had not turned over any information on any of these people. But they were detained, and the merchandise that they were trafficking in was confiscated, their money was taken, and later they were set free, and of course they then began an infernal hunt for me and my family.
This caused panic, not only in my immediate family but also among other relatives, because by this time they were already keeping us under surveillance—the homes of some of our close relatives were being watched.
Again, I decided that I would confide in someone, and that person was Señor Vasconcelos, but I never had the opportunity to meet with him. He was assassinated along with the secretary of Gobernación [Interior]. Perhaps, if I had had this chance, it would have changed my life. I do not know. But what I do know is that since that moment I have been fleeing from Mexico, and I have no desire to return for any reason.
Disgracefully, everything in that country is evil. There is so much corruption that it can have no end, no matter how much help Mexico gets from other countries. This stuff about the president of the Republic is pure farce. Looking on from my vantage point, I am so disillusioned. He is just a puppet manipulated by his ministers. Unfortunately, there is no need for him to commit himself to any Mexican, since he is already completely committed only to his own interests, just like many former presidents, and he is just the tip of the iceberg.
A very good friend of mine who has also left the country and is living in self-imposed exile from Mexico looked back in sadness at the fact that he had worked for a certain government official of Juárez.
My friend told me the following, and I have his authorization to record it here. This is his story:
That day I was in the foyer of the official’s office waiting to see him, when about eight men arrived. It looked like they were armed, and only one of them was carrying a briefcase. They asked to speak with the official, but his personal secretary did not let them in to see him. So then one of them made a phone call, and just after that, the official came out of his office to receive him personally, and he reprimanded his secretary for having obstructed this person’s access to his office. This person handed over the briefcase to the official. And after that I saw the man in his office, standing right next to his chair. But what happened to the secretary? He was scolded and punished so much that he decided to quit his job. At this moment, to the surprise of everyone there and to the surprise of the official’s personal secretary, we found out that the person who the secretary had tried to deny access to speak to the government official was the narco-trafficker in charge of the plaza of Ciudad Juárez and of the state of Chihuahua.
Imagine how many of these corrupt politicians there are out there! Now they are cloning themselves.... I hope that the citizens of that city that has been so beaten, defeated, terrorized by narco-trafficking will not commit the same error again!
My friend, like myself, we now see all of this with great sadness, and we can never again speak with any of the Mexican authorities. Now they are all mixed up in narco-trafficking, those that are not are murdered, like Señor Vasconcelos and the secretary of Gobernación [Mouriño] were murdered. I think that he was an intimate friend of President Felipe Calderón. The secretary paid very dearly for this friendship.
The sicario made the following comment in response to recent elections in the state of Chihuahua and the subsequent murder of a Juárez official:
God bless you. ...
Disgracefully, the people of Juárez decided to vote again for a kangaroo, to not call him what he really is, a rat who walks on two legs—a person who is not far removed from the intrigue and dirty dealings of the underworld of the city. And in part he is the protector along with another group of people who shelter under his wing. They think they are beyond reach of the law, they think they are vaccinated and immune, but the truth is, it isn’t like that.... Soon we’ll all be living in the crazy house.... Two or three losses have struck his team already before he takes power, but this is nothing except to remind him who is paying him and that he had better obey. This seems to be what’s happening, and again with this election, there will follow another three years of robbery with complete impunity.... The criminals will be reorganizing themselves inside the police, all in secret, just like before he manipulated the police in Juárez. . . . And in addition to all this, what has been happening will not end because every day there are more and more payments arriving from people who are defending the little they have left, which was once their patrimony but has been stripped from them in their towns and villages.