The alleged kidnappers and murderers of 14-year-old Fernando Marti have been captured in Mexico City. The arrest of these five men sends a couple of messages to would-be kidnappers in Mexico. One, it IS possible to nab lawbreakers in Mexico; and two, the chances of justice are enhanced if the victim’s family has the status to generate huge waves of publicity around the crime.
The crime was appalling. On June 4, Fernando was in a car being driven to school when he was stopped by “police” who abducted the boy and demanded a ransom of the family. The driver and bodyguard were killed at the scene. The family paid a ransom, reportedly as high as $6 million, and waited for Fernando to come home. Nearly two months later, his decomposing body was found in the trunk of a car.
The boy’s death caused such public outrage that it reached President Felipe Calderon himself. Responding to the outcry, he issued a 74-point anti-crime plan calling for a national system of standards for police, prosecutors and judges and the purging of corrupt officials. Mexican citizens marched against crime in the streets of several cities.
Similar kidnappings occur almost daily in Mexico, some with the same outrageous result. But in this case, the kidnappers picked on the wrong family. Fernando’s father, who owned a large chain of health clubs and sporting goods stores, was rich enough and well-regarded enough to draw attention to his son’s case.
The Band of Flowers gang was immediately suspected as the kidnappers. The group leaves marigolds, a flower often associated with Mexico’s Day of the Dead, with their victims’ bodies as a signature.
Now it gets more interesting. This gang has been suspected in a number of kidnappings in Mexico City during the past several years in which the abduction victims’ bodyguards and drivers have also been killed.
Yesterday, the mayor of Mexico City and a prosecutor proudly announced they had captured the leader and most members of a gang responsible for Marti’s kidnapping and slaying. "We made the commitment that there would be no impunity, and we are fulfilling it," Mayor Marcelo Ebrard said at an early morning press conference announcing that five members of the "Band of the Flower" were in custody.
This announcement begs the question: If they were apprehended within a month after finding Fernando’s body, why was it not possible to apprehend them if they were in business for “several years”?
Calderon has put the correct stake in the ground when he pledges to round up corrupt police. According to news reports, the kidnap gang’s leader, Sergio Ortiz Juarez, 63, was once a Mexico City detective. Some of the remaining four were also police detectives.
At least 800 people were kidnapped in Mexico last year, according to federal police. One can only hope that this apprehension is the beginning of a national crackdown on kidnapping and that the next one does not depend on the victim’s family clamoring for justice.