The Defense denies the accusations of three witnesses

Emir Olivares and Gustavo Castillo

The newspaper La Jornada
Friday, July 26, 2024, p. 5

In a detailed analysis, the National Defense Secretariat (Sedena) stated that the statements of three collaborating witnesses who accuse elements of the Army of having participated in the detention and disappearance of the Ayotzinapa students in September 2014 in Iguala, Guerrero, They have not been consistent and are contradictorybecause the military personnel who acted when the events occurred At no time did they have contact with the students.

He points out that the accusations are diametrically opposed to facts that have been widely proven regarding the place, time and circumstances in which military personnel acted during the events of the so-called Night of Iguala.

The military department also argues that in none Of the more than 20 thousand communications intercepted by the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), military personnel participate, but rather “they are dialogues between members of United Warriors (…) who claim to have relations with military personnel, without mentioning names or facts that could be corroborated or illegal activities that could be investigated.”

He adds that from March 30 to April 25, 2014 – months before the events – the DEA also managed to intercept messages in which members of the criminal group refer to lieutenants, military“guachos“, this without it being possible to confirm that they are Mexican Army personnel, as can be seen in the context of the conversations.

The pointing out of contradictions The Sedena’s statement is also based on extracts from some statements made by three collaborating witnesses identified as Juan, Carla and Net between 2015 and January 2024, and in arguments presented by the legal defense of the accused military personnel.

This information is part of the annexes of the report that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador delivered a few days ago to the families of the normalistas, on which the president has based himself to ensure that There is no evidence whatsoever that military personnel participated in the events of the night of September 26 and the early morning of September 27, 2014.

The annex published yesterday includes the position of the military defense, which describes implausible the statements of the collaborating witnesses. He points out that they were members of organized crime and it was only until After eight statements (when) they finally remembered that the military participated in the crimes.

He even puts forward the hypothesis that the three witnesses They were instructed to support the claim of the alleged participation of military personnel.

The secretary in charge of General Luis Cresencio Sandoval presents a comparative table between the statements made by witnesses and observations made by military personnel.

In a statement dated February 10, 2020 before the ministerial authorities, the protected witness Juan (whose identity is Gildardo López Astudillo, alias Cape Gilwho at the time of the events was the head of the plaza United Warriors in Iguala and during the process he made 11 statements) requested that Carlos Beristáin, a member of the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI), be present.

The witness said that on the night of the incident, soldiers participated in the arrest of the students; he added that some soldiers took several young people to the facilities of the 27th Infantry Battalion. to torture themwhich was commanded by Captain José Martínez Crespo and a series of Army commanders were on the payroll of United Warriorsamong other accusations.

Against this, the observations made by the military defense indicate that the witness was advised by one of the members of the GIEI and they add that according to statements from surviving student teachers, the arrests were carried out by municipal police. The Army did not take any of them.

The album

The witness identified by the code name Carla (his name is Carlos Leyva González) gave five testimonies. In the last one, recorded on January 24, 2024, he recalled Nine years after the event the surnames of military personnel who responded to United Warriors, after identifying them in a photo album created by the Commission for Truth and Access to Justice in the Ayotzinapa case (Covaj). He said that he had not said so before because he feared for his life.

In response, the military ombudsman criticized that the soldiers had been singled out based on the album, which consisted Only eight photographs of military personnel, without the legal formalities. Furthermore, this was done two days after a new arrest warrant was issued against him for facts different from those being investigated.

The witness Net (identified in the report as Ernesto Ramírez Gómez) made four statements between February 2021 and January 2024.

In the first ones, he referred generically to military personnel, according to the Sedena. In the last one, carried out on January 25 of this year, he identified seven soldiers also based on the Covaj photo album, which is criticized by the military defense on the grounds that it was carried out without the formalities of law.