Activists and family members said goodbye this Thursday to Magdaleno Pérez Santes, a 41-year-old father who died at home with multiple blows after being detained by members of the Poza Rica Municipal Police, Veracruz.
According to his family, last Monday, he went to the local authorities to request progress in the search for his daughter, Diana Paloma Pérez Vargas, who had been missing since 2019. That day, he was allegedly mocked by officers and, upon hearing them say that he “had nothing to do” due to his constant visits, got into an argument with them.
Hours later, he was arrested at his home, allegedly for offending the officers, although the official reason for his arrest has not been clarified. That Monday, he arrived home with multiple blows and complaining of severe headaches, and died.
Members of the “María Herrera” Collective of Families in Search, to which Pérez Santes belonged, pointed the finger at the Poza Rica police officers. Searching mothers and family members carried the coffin containing the body of “Maleno,” as he was affectionately known, to Benito Juárez Park on Thursday, a few meters from Poza Rica City Hall.
There, dressed in white, they read a statement and, holding photographs of the searching father, condemned the crime and urged justice.
“It hurts us so much that this cannot be happening in our Poza Rica. Maleno did not deserve to die like this. We need justice now, immediately. We will not wait for those people (police) to leave. We want and continue to repeat: Justice for Maleno! If we do not receive an urgent response from the authorities, we will set up a permanent encampment and announce a peaceful march for justice for Maleno in the city of Xalapa, Veracruz,” they stated.
The women recognized Pérez Santes’ work, stating that he accompanied local and national brigades with searches in states such as Morelos, Monterrey, and Guadalajara. Wearing shirts with the photograph of his daughter, who disappeared at 22, he dug clandestine graves and helped pave the way for searchers.
“We knew Maleno from the first day of the search for his daughter Diana, when he went out into the streets of his community, Poza Rica, to search for her at night and in the early morning, until the cowardly hands of the municipal police took his life,” they rebuked.
“Thank you for the many times your strength with the machete opened paths to search for them, thank you for your strength in digging with a shovel and pickaxe in the search sites, thank you for lending us our hands so that together we could extract more than 50,000 fragments of bone remains (…) thank you also for your simplicity, your humility, and your joy. You are and will be an example for many people. Go peacefully, Malenito, to Mother Earth, to whom we always ask for the return of our disappeared, to receive you in her bosom and make you flourish.”
Before her coffin, the mothers pledged to demand justice for her death and to continue the search for their daughter Paloma, who disappeared on November 22, 2019, while on her way to high school.
“It was the State!” they shouted.
Organizations such as the Veracruz State Citizens’ Council and the Prodh Center demanded a thorough investigation and punishment for those responsible.
The Poza Rica City Council, led by Morena Mayor Fernando Remes Garza, stated that it has requested that the Municipal Comptroller’s Office initiate the corresponding investigation to determine any administrative responsibilities.
“We reiterate our full willingness to collaborate with the competent authorities to properly clarify the facts in strict compliance with the law,” it stated.
Source: reforma
