The Mothers of April Association (AMA) recalled that this day marks the fourth anniversary of the murder of the 31-year-old artisan from Masaya Jorge René Zepeda. The young man was killed in a joint attack by police and paramilitaries when they attacked a barricade near the department’s police station.
“A single shot from a sniper stationed at the PN (National Police) tower hit him in the left temple. We stand in solidarity with his family and the families of Masaya », the Mothers of April Association wrote on their social networks.
Carolina Isabel Carrión García, the young man’s mother, describes her son as “a sociable and helpful boy, who had a permanent smile on his face.” Zepeda was a mechanic, he repaired bicycles, he learned to make sandals, to bake bread, and he learned painting and straightening.
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«He liked soccer a lot and in the afternoons he went to the Masaya boardwalk to play with his teammates. He was well liked and popular. He had several nicknames: here they called him “Comandante Chabelo”, because my name is Isabel, but his colleagues from Monimbó called him “Piña” and those from the San Juan neighborhood, “Chamber”, “says AMA in the publication in statements attributed to the mother of the murdered
Zepeda joined the social protests of April 2018 in support of the elderly and young people who demonstrated against the failed reforms to Social Security that sought to apply a 5% tax to pensions and retirement of older adults.
“Yasser Alexander Carrión, his brother, remembers that Jorge René was found at the march called in Masaya to support the protest of the elderly for the reforms to the pension law. They were walking when the Police threw a stun bomb at the elderly, which outraged his brother, who hours later joined the entrenched people who resisted at one of the barricades in the Monimbó neighborhood », recalls AMA.
The young man was shot in the head, was taken by ambulance to the hospital, but died on the way. According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) 355 people were killed in the context of the April revolt.
The Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) conducted an investigation in the country into the events of April and concluded that crimes against humanity were committed in Nicaragua.
