Unknowns Surrounding Mexico Murder of 8 Call Center Workers Found in Plastic Bags

Relatives of eight people missing in the Mexican state of Jalisco had little hope that they would find them alive was completely dashed on Tuesday.

Forensic medical examinations have concluded that the human remains found in 45 bags on May 31 in a ravine on the outskirts of the city of Guadalajara belong to young people.

The news could have gone almost unnoticed in a country that is sadly bled to death with at least 110,000 disappearances, as reflected in its official records. However, this case attracted attention from the very beginning for several reasons.

First, the disappearances became known in stages over a short period of time. Second, that they were all colleagues at work in call center in the municipality of Zapopan.

And it is his occupation of the telephone service that leads the investigation to try to clarify what happened.

The main version of the authorities indicates that elderly foreign citizens were allegedly lured out of the premises by phone calls to fraudulently sell tourist apartments.

The benefits they received served source of funding for an organized crime group, with particular suspicion of the Jalisco Nueva Generacion (CJNG) cartel.

However, some parents of young They stated that they knew nothing about these alleged illegal activities. and asked the authorities not to proactively prosecute their children, who told them they were selling tour packages to tourists.

eight workers

The investigation began when he disappeared on 20 May. Carlos Benjamin Garcia, 31 year. His mother told the El Heraldo de México newspaper that she last spoke to him on the phone that day when he was about to go to the laundry.

Having been unable to communicate again since then, he attempted to speak to Itzel Abigail Valladolid, a friend and colleague of his son to ask if he knew of his whereabouts. But he couldn’t talk to her either.

It was then that he decided to call the young woman’s mother, who, to his surprise, confirmed that both her 27-year-old daughter and Charles Davidanother of his 23-year-old sons has also been missing since May 22.

This day was also the last time they were seen. Jesus Alfredo Salazar and Arturo Robles 37 and 30 years old; Maira Karina Velasquez, 29 years; And Jorge Miguel Moreno, 28; whose disappearance was reported to the authorities in the following days.

As early as June 1, the Prosecutor General’s Office became aware of the disappearance Juan Antonio Estrada, 34 years. The man also disappeared on May 22 when he was going to work, and it was believed that he may be related to the same case.

When the authorities were convinced of the common connection between all of them, they went to search the establishment where they worked.

Jalisco prosecutors said they found marijuana, a piece of cloth and a mop with “reddish spots” inside. Boards were also found with the names of foreigners, “membership notes or ‘timeshares’ (places for tourist accommodation to be used during a certain period of the year) and economic goals to be achieved”.

He also stated that the premises did not have a license for any type of activity. The prosecutor’s office also said that the tenant of the property was wanted, although so far No arrests have been reported in this case.
A second location with similar characteristics was later recorded as a suspected operating center for the same company, where money counting machines and “abstracts of pre-designed dialogues in English for phone calls to foreigners” were identified.

“Total time”

While the search for young people continued, official information was received from droppers about the alleged activities in which they were engaged.

May 29 Governor of Jalisco, Enrique Alfaroacknowledged that the case was “much more complicated than it seemed” and ruled out that it was call center but “an operating center of a different nature.”

But in a statement, the state government went even further and disclosed what is considered the main focus of the investigation: the case may be related to companies that conduct scams targeting older Americans advanced through the sale of “timeshare” on the coast of Jalisco.

State officials pointed to a possible link to the companies, which were identified in late April in a report released by the United States. In it, the Treasury exposed the business network in Jalisco. associated with the Jalisco Nueva Generacion cartel and is dedicated to telephone scams as a source of financing for a criminal group.

Set up in the tourism municipality of Puerto Vallarta, the cell will specialize in deceiving older Americans into believing they are buying or renting vacation homes in Mexico, according to the report.

A day after this hypothesis became known, the Minister of Security of Mexico Rosa Isela, was questioned about the case at the president’s daily conference and confirmed that they would be “people who were involved in real estate fraud and telephone extortion.”

CJNG hypothesis

When asked if CJNG would be involved in this case, Isela did not indicate specific authorship. “We see which group he fits. I can’t tell you until we have evidence from the investigation,” he replied.

Until now, not a single authority has officially pointed to a cartel led by El Mencho. The governor of Jalisco limited himself to saying that this is a question “which is clearly linked to organized crime”, Therefore, communication is maintained with both the federal government and the US authorities.

Uncertainty as to why the eight young people disappeared remains as numerous as the hypotheses.

Sources in Mural from Grupo Reforma assured that the case could have been revenge on the part of the CJNG, given that their fraud would have been exposed in the US report. thanks to information from call center from Zapopan.

However, according to US consular officials for the Milenio newspaper, the young people may have disappeared because they tried to quit the company. With this, the cartel would like to send a warning message to other people who are collaborating with them in timeshare scam schemes.

Amidst all these investigations and hypotheses, the relatives of the young people clung to the hope that they would live on, and staged protests and sit-ins, demanding that the authorities be more involved in their search.

When on May 31st they discovered 45 bags of human remains on the outskirts of Guadalajara, prosecutors said some of the remains matched the physical characteristics of those of the disappeared youth.

However, it was necessary to wait for the studies of the Institute of Forensic Medicine to confirm his identity, which happened on Tuesday after more than two weeks of torment.

Now relatives demand to be cleared of responsibility and to find those who cut short the lives of their children in the country. where more than 90% of reported cases go unpunished.

---

remember, that you can receive notifications from BBC Mundo. Download the new version of our app and activate them so you don’t miss out on our best content.