Miguel Parajón’s regime took his two children from him. The first, Jimmy, from a direct shot to the heart during the 2018 protests, and the second, Yader, from a 10-year sentence in political revenge for demanding justice for his murdered brother.
The 66-year-old man has been left alone in his house, where he is accompanied by memories, photographs and objects that both children once enjoyed in life and in freedom.
“God has me strong. God loves me because I tell him another person can’t stand all this impression that I have. All this suffering. All this that another person is happening to me can’t stand it, or they die faster or they get an illness, ”she reflects.
At the time of this interview, only 24 hours have passed since he learned that his youngest son, 31, was sentenced to 10 years in prison by Judge Uliza Tapia Silva, in a political trial in which the defense can do little. and he, as a father and only close relative, was not allowed to attend.
Two tragedies in less than a year
When his eldest son, Jimmy José Parajón Gutiérrez, was murdered, his family had already faced a great loss. Months ago, at the end of 2017, his mother passed away after fighting cancer. So, Miguel Parajón thought that at least the company of his two sons would ease his pain. However, in April 2018, when the nationwide protests erupted, none of the three could be indifferent.
Jimmy, who was then 35 years old and the father of five children, joined the entrenched at the Polytechnic University (Upoli). He didn’t stay inside, but he did bring them help. His father and his brother agreed because they were never in tune with the Ortega administration or with Sandinismo. But tragedy soon loomed over his house.
At around 1:20 a.m. on Friday, May 11, 2018, Miguel Parajón was called by his youngest son to say that his brother was injured. At first, the father thought it was a minor injury, but at 2:30 in the afternoon, he was told that he had died.
“That’s where I felt bad,” he confesses to CONFIDENTIAL while his voice drowns.
“I felt my feet buckle. I didn’t want to believe until I got to the Vivian Pellas Hospital and saw my boy lying there, already dead. And I looked at him with his bullet here (points to his chest) because I looked at the hole”. His voice chokes her again. He pauses.
Jimmy, who was a fan of motorcycle racing and had a small mechanical workshop in his house, died a few minutes after being hit by a bullet. When he was shot he was on a motorcycle a few blocks from Upoli. Those who helped first took him to a medical post that they improvised inside the university, but seeing that he had a bullet in his left nipple, with no way out, they transferred him to the Vivian Pellas Hospital where he finally died.
In December 2018, the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights published a devastating report: Daniel Ortega’s regime committed crimes against humanity against Nicaraguans murdered between April and May 2018. According to the information of the GIEI, Jimmy would have been shot by a sniper installed on the terrace of the Hotel Restaurant Juri Jean, which they would have accessed through an adjoining vacant lot. The Parajón family took Jimmy’s body to Forensic Medicine to start an investigation, but they didn’t even want to give them the bullet. There was also no progress on who killed him.
In the living room of the Parajón house there is an altar that his family put up in honor of Jimmy’s memory. Above is one of the last photos he ever took in his life, followed by smaller portraits from other times. There are also candles that his father lights for him alone, and next to it is the motorcycle on which he once raced in motorcycle races and which Don Miguel refuses to part with. Now images of Yader, his other son, a political prisoner for demanding justice, have also been added.
They asked for justice and received siege
After Jimmy’s death, Miguel and his son Yader took advantage of every space they had to ask for justice. His father joined the Mothers of April Association, which brings together mothers and relatives of the more than 300 victims of the 2018 protests. The government’s response to their claim was the siege.
“Almost all of 2020 they besieged us. Police cars were parked outside the house, there were three, four, even five patrol cars. They wouldn’t let me out and what was I going to do? I can’t oppose those people, they have weapons, I don’t”, she explains.
The siege they lived through for two years in a row took away their peace of mind, isolated them and even took away their jobs. People avoided going to Don Miguel’s refrigeration equipment workshop, nor did they come to buy from Yader’s small grocery store, with which he earned money for his Psychology career expenses that he was studying at the Central American University (UCA).
Yader was also dedicated to demanding justice for Jimmy’s death. He was even detained for five days in 2019. His father remembers that Yader left his house and before he reached the corner the officers took him away without giving any explanation.
“I yelled at them: Why are you arresting me? and they just told me “shut up”. Because I resisted the kidnapping, they beat me. They transferred me to District IV and they never explained the reason for my detention, not even today that I was released,” Yader said after he was released.
Miguel Parajón did not know that his son planned to go into exile. The last time he saw him released, he told him that he would go to Jinotega. “If I had realized it, he would have told him: you are taking risks, remember that they are following you,” he laments. However, when he heard from him again, it was when he was told that Yader had been detained at the border with Honduras, when he was trying to go into exile. There his tragedy worsened.
a father’s pain
Since Yader Parajón was arrested, don Miguel has seen him four times. He is thinner and paler, he describes himself. But his greatest concern is that if something happens to him, if he is also taken prisoner or gets sick, there is no one to look after his son.
“I still support myself, but sometimes I get upset because if I get sick, who is going to see this kid? And he tells me to go out and have fun, don’t get into that plan that I’m going to go out, but it’s difficult, ”she says.
Three or four times a week, Miguel Parajón gathers the water and small supplies (milk, serum, yogurt, razors, underwear) that they let him through at El Chipote and heads off to drop her off. He takes the bus, to shorten the distance, and then looks for a taxi or mototaxi that will take him in 30 or 40 córdobas to the facilities of this prison. And sometimes he can’t afford to pay more and has no choice but to walk, a trip that takes about 20 minutes.
“There are some police officers who are calm. There are others who don’t, who are brave. They tell you, ‘Get out of there,’” she describes.
Yader Parajón’s trial was held on February 1, behind closed doors in El Chipote. It was the first of the processes initiated against the political prisoners captured between May and November 2021. The Prosecutor’s Office accused him of “conspiracy to undermine national integrity to the detriment of the State of Nicaragua and Nicaraguan society.” That day, the political prisoner, Yaser Vado, was also tried, sentenced to 15 years.
as he knew CONFIDENTIAL, the prosecution witnesses were seven agents from Police Station One, who were in charge of the investigative acts. Of those, three gave conflicting accounts and one was reluctant to respond.
“My boy’s conviction is unjust, it is illegal. He has no crime. He did not steal, nor did he kill. Why am I being accused? For claiming justice for his brother. He is a very focused kid. He dreamed of being a graduate in Psychology, having his profession, but that’s as far as he got. They ruined his future for me. Perhaps God – his father exclaims – will later give me another chance”. He hopes to see him succeed.
