By the beginning of 2007, it seemed as though I had managed to put the nightmare behind me, for at the outset of January, I won my case against multimillionaire Kamel Nacif. In March, I set off on a sixteen-day tour of the United States, beginning in Milwaukee on the 23rd of the month, where I received Amnesty International’s Ginetta Sagan Award for my work in defense of the human rights of women and children.
But there was still a long road to travel. The wheels had begun to turn at the Supreme Court after an initial investigation had come to a premature close when suspicions arose that a plot existed to “cover up” for Governor Marín. Now a second constitutional investigation was underway, headed by Justice Juan Silva Meza, a respectable, highly ethical lawyer who also served as a judge at the Criminal Court for many years. On May 3, I went face-to-face with the Cancun pedophile in a session that lasted nearly thirteen hours and culminated in yet another death threat. Despite this, I felt stronger than ever. Over the course of the last several months, the demons had shown their true colors, and I had faced them successfully. It appeared the winds were finally in my favor.
Then, barely five days after I had sat with Succar in the session chamber, as I was returning to Mexico City from Juarez with a group of fellow journalists, we were attacked.
My bodyguards were waiting for me at the airport; the PGR had sent an SUV for our use during my stay in the capital city. Journalists Alejandro Páez and Jorge Zepeda, along with director general of Nexos magazine Rafael Pérez Gay and his wife, were heading to the same general area of the city, so I offered to give them a lift. Just as we were picking up speed and preparing to pull onto the Viaducto freeway, the SUV began to fishtail, and the driver, who was one of the agents assigned to protect me, instantly slammed on the brakes, swerving to the curb in order to bring the vehicle to a stop. When we got out of the car, we saw that the tire had been blown out. Everything changed, however, when we saw the face of Agent Nuño, my head bodyguard, go pale as she exchanged a series of quick glances with the driver. In her hands, she held the wheel’s lug nuts, or fasteners. She hadn’t even needed a wrench to pull them free. Everything moved very quickly after that. Agent Nuño told us to step away from the vehicle, that we had to get out of there, and that we should flag down a couple of taxis as quickly as possible. The lug nuts glinted in the light as she held them in the palm of her hand; they were stripped down and scratched, as though they had been gone at with a hacksaw. The wheel was not correctly attached but rather shifted from its proper position on the axle, and the whole thing was about to fall right off, rim and all. We hailed a cab and drove to a colleague’s house. Agent Nuño asked me to avoid going outside until they could determine for sure what had really happened.
“Do you think this was intentional?” I asked, still incredulous.
“Yes, ma’am, it may have been an attempt on your life. Please, stay inside—I’m going to report this to my superiors.”
It was not until that precise moment that I began to feel worried, and my friends even more so. I decided to telephone SEIDO, but no luck. Then I dialed José Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, the former assistant attorney general for SEIDO, a man with deep knowledge of the Succar and Kamel Nacif cases. I told him what had happened, limiting my comments to a strict description of the facts; at the time, I expected him, an expert in organized crime, to tell me that my security team was overreacting and that what had happened was most likely nothing. I couldn’t have been further from the truth. He instructed me to call my lawyers and file a report immediately. Now that Governor Marín was colluding with Nacif and Succar, all three of them stood to lose much more if I persisted in my efforts to bring them to court. Moreover, although Succar’s threats had been made from prison, they could not, as Santiago Vasconcelos reminded me, be taken lightly.
At this point, he put me through to a special agent at the AFI, an expert trainer in driving and high-speed chases. I explained once more, in full detail, what had happened to our vehicle, and he responded with the warning that a “job” of that nature, if carried out properly, could have easily killed us. The idea, the expert explained, is for the rear wheel on the driver’s side to come completely off its axle. The Suburbans put out that year were notoriously unstable, and had the wheel detached fully, the vehicle would have flipped, and at eighty or ninety miles an hour, the speed at which we had been driving, the accident would most surely have killed us. The following day, I went down to the PGR offices with my lawyers and we filed charges—yet again—with the Office of the Special Prosecutor for Crimes Against Journalists, this time for attempted murder.
In a further act of confirmation of our blighted state, the Special Prosecutor’s Office took more than three months to react to our report of the attack. Then one Friday night, as I arrived home, my bodyguards spotted a car parked outside the building, with someone sitting at the wheel. They approach the individual, who said he’d been sent by the PGR to deliver a summons for me. Ten o’clock at night on a Friday, and the PGR is out delivering summonses? we marveled.
I took receipt of the document and read in amazement that pursuant to my having filed charges of attempted murder, the PGR was convening me for the very next day—a Saturday, and without the presence of my lawyers—to undergo a psychological evaluation in order to provide further explanations on the attack against me. They did not request to see the vehicle’s lug nuts, nor did they ask to interrogate my security team or the other material witnesses, or petition that the PGR immediately hand over the SUV for analysis in order to verify whether or not it had been tampered with. The Special Prosecutor’s Office only wanted to determine whether I was in my right mind and telling the truth. I telephoned my lawyers in a fit of outrage. I did not respond to the summons. At the time of this book’s publication, the special prosecutor has still not analyzed the vehicle we were traveling in, which remains to this date parked outside the PGR offices, and the lug nuts are still safely tucked away. Meanwhile, a female PRI-party congressional deputy allied to Marín declared mockingly in the press that she herself had filed down the lug nuts, that it was she who had attempted to kill me. A Puebla radio station gave me a cassette with her full statement. I turned it in to the Special Prosecutor’s Office—a civil servant there told my lawyer that it was no big deal, that the congresswoman was simply making a joke.
Thankfully, it wasn’t all bad news. On June 21, one week before the Supreme Court was expected to present its findings, a group of filmmakers, intellectuals, artists, and social activists ran a full-page spread in the big national newspapers entitled, “Once Upon a Time There Was a Pedophile.” With the names of multi-award-winning film directors Alfonso Cuarón, Luis Mandoki, Guillermo del Toro, and Alejandro González Iñárritu heading the list of signatures, the spread quickly became a sounding board for moral outrage, a rallying point for international solidarity, as it called upon the Supreme Court justices to listen to the public’s concerns over the case:
We urge the justices of the Supreme Court to return to the citizens of Mexico our right to trust the courts. So far, the reprisals dealt to Succar’s victims and the campaign of persecution against Lydia Cacho would appear to confirm the views of eight out of every ten Mexicans, who believe the reporting of crimes to be useless because the institutions of the state will not afford them the proper protection. If the Puebla authorities are cleared of all responsibility, if the obvious existence of networks propagating child pornography, child abuse, and the trafficking of minors in Mexico is not recognized, it is highly unlikely that any other citizen will dare to step forward and challenge in court those men who use the power of the state to corrupt society and strengthen criminal activities in Mexico.
Among those who lent their names to the text were Noam Chomsky, Ana Claudia Talancón, Sean Penn, Ashley Judd, Milos Forman, Benicio del Toro, Blue Demon Jr., Ángeles Mastretta, Bridget Fonda, Carlos Reygadas, Ana de la Reguera, Charlize Theron, Clive Owen, Susan Sarandon, Woody Harrelson, and Salma Hayek. More than three thousand signatures were gathered, a mixture of the usual, well-known supporters of causes as well as newcomers. The text was sent to the Court. The dedicated, loving solidarity of individuals representing the entire spectrum of religious beliefs and political leanings made us feel safer than ever.
The findings of the Court’s investigative committee were finally communicated to the public on June 26, 2007. I was there at the Supreme Court when the session was called to order, with Jorge and my lawyers at my side. For an hour and a half, we listened to Justice Silva Meza. And what a surprise was in store for us! For the very first time in Mexican history, a full and thorough investigation of human rights and women’s rights had been conducted by the highest court in the land, without any intrusive meddling by a president and his iron fist.
When Justice Silva Meza presented his conclusions and explained how he and his investigative team had arrived at them, tears welled up in my eyes. For nearly two hours, I managed to abstain from crying in public. Not because it is my belief that tears are demeaning to people in general or to women in particular but because, on the one hand, there are those in the media who will always seek to highlight the dramatic in any situation—the same ones who insisted in response to every single interview I gave that I was playing up my role as the devastated victim. But I wasn’t. I was defending my dignity as a woman and my work as a journalist. I had also come to understand by this point that my battle was the battle of millions of Mexican women and men who had been following my story every step of the way, and not because of anything I was doing as an individual, but rather in order to see for themselves whether it was true that the Mexican state, despite all the evidence, could possibly be capable of such complicity. On the other hand, when I chose at times to control my tears in the presence of my colleagues, it was due to the fact that I often feared that if I began to cry, I would end up drowning in my own sadness and become unable to ever return to a position of strength from which to continue the fight. In order to remain brave, to be able to see each act of corruption for what it was, and to respond to every move in this bitter, protracted battle with the indispensible clear-sightedness of a chess player, I needed the inner calm and peace that my daily meditations, together with my convictions and unwavering sense of solidarity, provided.
This time, I told myself, it was different—my country’s Supreme Court was acknowledging the crimes committed against the young girls and boys, as well as those committed against my own person for having given them a voice in my book. In underlining the seriousness of the problem of child exploitation in Mexico, Silva Meza remarked, “Journalist Lydia Cacho did not go far enough in her book.” For a single, shining moment, I felt I could finally let down my guard and cast off my protective armor—the truth was there for the whole nation to see. What more could we ask?
But then came what felt like a slap to the face, and it instantly checked my tears. Chief Justice Ortiz Mayagoitia gave the court clerk leave to read a statement supposedly written by Justice José de Jesús Gudiño Pelayo, who had lost his voice and was unable to read the statement himself. The stage was set. In his statement, Gudiño called on the Supreme Court to withhold its ruling on the case “until such time as the rules for reaching a determination have been decided upon.”
If we compare this to a soccer game played in front of a full stadium of fans, it would be like the referee declaring that there was “no winner” until they conducted a review of the rules by which goals would be defined. Several constitutional lawyers assured me that if the ruling had been in favor of the governor, no one would have asked that the rules be reexamined a posteriori.
Justice Silva Meza was visibly taken aback; the media representatives present in the room couldn’t believe it, either. But attorneys Aguilar Zínzer and Fabián Aguinaco, two members of the seven-man team defending Governor Marín, stood behind us, unflustered, while the justices cast their votes one after another and agreed to postpone their ruling.
We walked out of the court, and the governor’s lawyers, ecstatic and smiling, told the press that they were very satisfied because the Supreme Court justices had heeded their request to protect the rights of Governor Marín. One of them later denied having made the statement, but thanks to a reporter on the scene, his words were recorded for all posterity.
Various analysts concluded that a politically motivated negotiation had taken place between the PRI (Marín’s party) and the PAN in order to smooth the way and set the stage for some difficult agreements on fiscal reform, agreements that the president needed secured, being as they were so instrumental for his economic plans for the country.
But the truth had been spoken that day at the Supreme Court, and the media reflected society’s outrage faithfully. And near the end of September 2007, hope came and peeked its head around the corner once more.
After keeping us in suspense for thirty days, the special commission upheld the Court’s investigative methodology. The results of Silva Meza’s team of justices and lawyers will remain forever in the annals of the Mexican justice system. Below, I have transcribed some of the team’s findings, taken directly from the public reading of them made in Silva Meza’s own voice.
LAST RECOURSE: THE SUPREME COURT OF JUSTICE AND JUAN SILVA MEZA
First. That there did exist a coordinated effort between the authorities of the states of Puebla and Quintana Roo to violate the fundamental rights of the journalist Lydia María Cacho Ribeiro, and that the democratic principles of federalism and separation of powers were likewise violated, in particular the principle of judicial independence.
Second. That there did exist repeated, systematic violations of fundamental rights to the prejudice of minors.
Third. That the definitive decision regarding whether or not to proceed with the impeachment charges that may in such cases be brought against high-level servants of the Federation such as graduate of law and Constitutional Governor of the State of Puebla Mario Plutarco Marín Torres shall fall to the Congress of the Union.
Fourth. That as concerns the responsibility on the part of the authorities that participated directly or indirectly in the governor’s dealings with the businessman he was aiding, it shall fall to the legislature of each federal entity1616 to analyze the question of whether to initiate the corresponding procedures against the chief justice of the Superior Court of Justice of the State of Puebla, Guillermo Pacheco Pulido, as well against the attorneys general for the states of Puebla and Quintana Roo.
Fifth. That it shall fall to a plenary session of the Superior Court of Justice of the State of Puebla to decide, without the participation of those individuals in question, upon the nature of the conduct of its judicial servants, particularly that of Fifth Criminal Court judge for the State of Puebla, Rosa Celia Pérez González.
Sixth. That it shall fall to the Offices of the Attorneys General for the states of Puebla and Quintana Roo to carry out the penal actions corresponding to corruption of authorities and to crimes against the administration of justice.
Seventh. That it shall fall to all institutions dependent upon the Office of the Attorney General of Mexico, as well as to the Offices of the State Attorneys General, to combat and pursue with all the strength and ingenuity of the State any and all acts of pederasty, child exploitation, and child pornography. To this end, and given that this is a segment of the population whose incomplete development prevents them from understanding the damage caused to them or from participating in its solution, it is suggested that a periodic, public presentation of the findings of such investigations be made, the secrecy or confidentiality of the victim and of the aggressor being justified only when, for reasons of degree or manner of participation, the victim’s identity is apt to become known.
Eighth. That it is hereby recommended that the jurisdictional courts, when acting to gather proof elements for conviction, give preference to the rights of the victim, ensuring inasmuch as possible the full right to participation of the latter’s progenitors, professional advisors, and legal representatives.
In order to arrive at these findings, the public servants working in Marín’s administration were investigated, and by judicial order, twenty-one wiretaps were authorized on telephones belonging to the following individuals: Governor Mario Marín, Kamel Nacif, Margarita Santos (Marín’s wife), Irma Benavides (Nacif’s ex-wife), judge Rosa Celia Pérez, Chief Justice for the Superior Court of Justice of the State of Puebla Guillermo Pacheco Pulido, and others. Taps on the phones of several secretaries and others receiving orders from Marín were also authorized. In a 1,205-page document, which was analyzed with extraordinary meticulousness in issue number 87 of the political magazine emeequis, the Supreme Court’s special commission unraveled and laid out, step by step, all of the lies and accusations that had formed part of the criminal conspiracy against me.
Justice Silva Meza concluded as follows:
The work of the Investigative Commission revealed that the report filed by the journalist [Lydia Cacho] provides but a small picture of the very serious situation in which a large number of minors find themselves, for in order to confirm the existence of the sexual abuse of which some of the individuals mentioned by the journalist had been victims, the Investigative Commission was prompted to verify, with all the resources at its disposal, the various rights violations that might be affecting a portion of the population. To that end [. . .] the Investigative Commission requested information from diverse public and private institutions, especially from those concerned with the prosecution and administration of justice, as these latter constitute the best source of information to which the Supreme Court of Justice has access.
The current Special Prosecutor for the Detection of Crimes Against Sexual Freedom, Its Normal Development, and Public Decency, which operates under the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Quintana Roo, reported the initiation of 1,595 prior inquiries into sexual crimes committed against minors. The delegate from the Special Prosecutor’s Office for the Defense of Minors and Families provided sixteen files corresponding to cases of minors who are in their protective custody and in situations of risk, fifteen of them as a result of child sexual abuse and commercial sexual exploitation.
The file containing these findings was submitted to the Congress of the Union’s Subcommittee for Initial Analysis. The document was carefully reviewed, and sufficient material was identified to justify a request that Mario Marín be stripped of his political immunity and denied the right to stand for election in the future. Nevertheless, a number of PRI and PAN deputies refused to vote against the “Precious Guv’,” among them Diódoro Carrasco, a former PRI-party activist and now a member of the PAN, the party to which President Calderón belongs.
Some of Mexico’s most powerful politicians, including the chairman of the Congressional Committee on Finance and Public Credit, Jorge Estefan Chidiac Charbel, have defended the governor fiercely. Chidiac served as Secretary of Social Development for the State of Puebla, and he maintains a close relationship with the “Precious Guv’.” Others have taken sides depending on the potential usefulness of “the Lydia Cacho case” in helping them to attack their political enemies. The truth of the matter is that despite the Supreme Court’s having carried out an impeccable investigation, despite its findings’ having already been translated into legal frameworks for dealing with such issues in the future, and even despite extra time having been granted to the governor’s seven lawyers for the submission of evidence in support of his defense, the Congress of the Union still does not seem to understand that every person who votes in favor of and defends the governor is using the power of the state to perpetuate corruption and is indirectly protecting the pedophilia networks. The nation’s legislators parade around with an utter lack of scrupulousness, as though it were not part of their purview to behave ethically.
On October 16, 2007, leftist senator Pablo Gómez, one of those to originally present the impeachment request against the governor, stood at a press conference with the Puebla Civic Front.1717 He explained that he was at a loss to understand what was going on within the PAN, because “if PAN-party deputy Diódoro Carrasco Altamirano fails to convene the Subcommittee for Initial Analysis, as corresponds to his role as president of said subcommittee, it will not be possible to go ahead with the impeachment process against the governor of Puebla, Mario Marín Torres.” Carrasco was a member of the PRI until a short time ago, when he decided the right-wing PAN party offered him better opportunities for wielding power.
A few more months would have to pass before we would learn the outcome of this whole affair; in the meantime, we had been provided with a snapshot of our nation’s criminal justice system and the extent of the far-reaching pacts made by corrupt elements of political power to the detriment of the average citizen.
The lessons learned are countless. Never before have I possessed such a clear understanding of why Mexico has not yet become—and will not easily become—a country governed by the rule of law.
