Minutes before 1:00 p.m. a woman died after receiving three bullets in Viaducto and Cuauhtémoc, in the Roma Sur neighborhood. Less than two and a half hours later, the alternate deputy Diana Sánchez Barrios was also shot. The attack was in Motolinia, almost 5 de Mayo, in the Historic Center. She was hospitalized, as was her cousin, but another of her companions died.
The victim of Roma, the criminal lawyer Oralia Pérez Garduño, 35 years old, was traveling aboard an SUV that was allegedly pursued by her hitmen at least from the Siglo XXI Medical Center.
According to witnesses, the attackers who were traveling on a motorcycle fired a dozen times. At the crime scene, the experts left marks on the spent cartridges scattered on the asphalt.
Two bullets hit the chest and one hit the head, according to police reports.
The attackers, two men, fled on the same motorcycle they were riding.
“We heard the shots and it didn’t take the police five minutes to arrive,” a food vendor located on Cuauhtémoc Avenue and Viaducto, opposite Parque Delta, told Excelsior.
“We only heard the gunfire and the sound of the truck when it half-hit the construction fence (retaining wall). It stopped and we heard the motorcycle. (The attackers) went towards the Chabacano Metro. Then we learned that they got into the Metro,” said Gustavo, an employee of an automotive branch located a few meters from the crime scene.
In front of 153 Manuel Caballero, about 200 steps before the Chabacano Metro station, a motorcycle was seized that was identified as the vehicle used by the hitmen.
The head of the Prosecutor’s Office confirmed in a brief press conference that Pérez Garduño was a criminal lawyer, but ruled out that he worked in the department. What is known about the victim is that she worked on the creation of specialized prosecutors for femicides.
The Secretary of Citizen Security, Pablo Vázquez, said that one of the lines of investigation will be her professional environment and the matters handled in her office, but he did not rule out her family and personal environment.
Blocks from the Zócalo
Around 3:24 p.m., three blocks from the Zócalo and another block from Bellas Artes, Diana Sánchez Barios was walking along the pedestrian corridor of Motolinia. She was accompanied by her cousin on a scooter and another man, presumably her partner.
Near 5 de Mayo, a hitman comes from behind and shoots the victim’s partner, then the cousin of the leader of merchants and trans activist, and again the partner.
Sánchez Barrios runs inside a pharmacy to take shelter, but the attacker chases her and shoots her inside.
The attacker runs off and boards a motorcycle on 5 de Mayo, where an accomplice was already waiting for him. Both fled.
Later, the Prosecutor’s Office personnel seized the alleged motorcycle of the attackers on Nicolás León Avenue, in the Jardín Balbuena neighborhood, Venustiano Carranza municipality.
Alejandra Barrios Richard, the victim’s mother, attributed the attack to La Unión and to members of her own family.
“To La Unión, more than anything; all those who are bad there in Las Uniones who are now kids who pay them any amount and they occupy them,” she said outside the hospital where her relative was admitted.
When asked if she had received any threats, the street vendor leader responded: “Yes, I received threats from my own family, that they were going to order us to be killed.
“It’s all because of envy, anger, if not, then they paid someone to do it to my daughter. My daughter had no rivals from anyone.”
Diana Sánchez Barrios, who is a substitute deputy for her sister Silvia for the PRI, was in the city Congress before the attack.
Silvia presented a motion to urge the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to train its staff so that they do not commit “verbal aggression, discrimination” against people from the transgender community when they go to apply for passports.
After the motion was approved in the plenary session, the Sánchez Barrios sisters celebrated in the lobby of Congress and took several photos on the steps.
Diana walked to Motolinia, where the hitman shot her and her companions.
Source: excelsior
