Murillo Karam stated that the case should be closed in order that those responsible might be punished, although he explained that “closed is not the appropriate word,” because six arrest warrants have yet to be served. [The outstanding warrants] include those for Felipe Flores Velázquez, Iguala’s former secretary of public security; Gildarlo López, El Gil, regional leader of Warriors United, and his secretary, a man identified as El Fercho, who transmitted the orders to murder the students.

“Without a doubt, (the investigations lead) to the conclusion that the student teachers were deprived of liberty, deprived of life, incinerated and thrown into the San Juan River. In that order.

“This is the historic truth of the events, based on evidence provided by science, as is shown in the legal file, and it has allowed exercise of criminal action against the 99 involved who have so far been arrested. Allowing the action of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which has requested the imposition of penalties higher than those provided by the law.” [To wit:] 140 years in prison for the charges of aggravated kidnapping, which is strengthened by the victim’s murder.

Both the PGR head [Murillo Karam] and the director of the Agency for Criminal Investigation Agency (AIC), Tomás Zerón de Lucio, reported that María de los Ángeles Pineda Villa will not be charged with the crime of forced disappearance, because that crime can only be attributed to public officials. However, they said that such a charge will be filed against Iguala’s former mayor, José Luis Abarca.

Investigation

La Jornada: Prosecutor [Murillo Karam], is the case closed?

“The investigation has to be closed because the guilty have to be punished. Closing an investigation is perhaps not the appropriate word. Since I have not arrested all the perpetrators, I cannot close the case; that is, closed is not the best word. But if you ask me, the [evidentiary] elements that the investigation has [compiled] are sufficient for determining that they killed and incinerated them there. I would say yes, and (there is) much more (evidence) than in many [other] cases: there are four confessions, not just one [confession], by the perpetrators; there are confessions by the police who transported them to that place and handed them over to these people; four of them [alleged perpetrators] are fully identified.

Yesterday the PGR head indicated that the students were initially headed to Chilpancingo to gather resources [get public donations] to travel to Mexico City in order to participate in the march [commemorating] the October 2, 1968, student massacre at Tlatelolco; however, one of the normal school students who was in charge of the group decided to divert the route and ordered them to go to Iguala.

During their visit to that city, a halcón (lookout) for Warriors United reported that (members of) a rival [criminal] gang, The Reds, were trying to take over the “plaza” (city) [i.e., gang territory], and he alerted the Iguala police.

In this situation, former mayor José Luis Abarca ordered that they be stopped “in whatever way.” The police chased and shot at them, killing three [students],  the driver of a bus carrying members of the Hornets soccer club, a soccer player and a woman who was passing by in a taxi.

Zerón Lucio said that with the results that have been obtained

“the motive is established, in that the students were targeted by criminals as being part of a rival band of organized crime in the region. This is why they were, at first, deprived of liberty and, ultimately, of life.

“The version (that they were rival drug traffickers) was transmitted from one level to another within the criminal organization and appeared among the gang’s leaders, including José Luis Abarca Velázquez, María de los Ángeles Pineda Villa (wife of former mayor ) and Sidronio Casarrubias Salgado (former leader of the organization).”

Murillo Karam added:

“It has been conclusively established that the remains of matter found in the bags in the San Juan River, such as earth, tire residuals and other solid elements that were analyzed, are chemically related to those that we found in the garbage dump.”

According to the information presented, during two reconstructions conducted in the Cocula garbage dump and the San Juan River with the perpetrators of the murder and disappearance of the students, the PGR allegedly managed to identify three normal school students who had attended the school longer and who were presumably leading the group that moved on to Iguala. They were:

“Bernardo Flores, El Cochiloco; Jorge Luis Hernández Barajas, El Flaquito, and Miguel Ángel Martinez, El Platilludo.”

Zerón de Lucio said that according to detainees’ statements:

“These three students were interrogated and executed at the garbage dump because they were considered, by those who had kidnapped them, to be members of the [rival] criminal gang.”

However, Attorney Murillo Karam stated that there is no evidence that any of the normal school students might have been involved with the criminal gangs; moreover, it is known from the investigations that the victims only wanted to study to become teachers.

Questioning by Parents and Others

Murillo Karam stated that

“all the lines of investigation that have emerged have been immediately made public, given the importance of the case. At all times, in the moment that they have wanted it, the parents’ representatives have been close to the legal file; such that when they requested it, (they were even present) at interrogations themselves.”

Asked about questions raised by academics, representatives and students’ parents; namely, that it is not possible that an incineration [of that many people] might have been carried out in the garbage dump, Murillo Karam stated that

“studies conducted by the Institute of Biology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico indicate that, first, plants showed post-fire growth and, secondly, dipterous [insect] larvae collected at the site also began their growth after the fire. Both studies confirm the same date.”

Murillo Karam added that according to the studies, the

“place and conditions were conducive to there having been an optimal effect for oxygenation of the fire, which permitted combustion for a prolonged period.

“The biological opinion indicates that the plants were affected by the heat in the area” and that the inferno that—according to the investigations—would have incinerated the students covered an area of 180 square meters [215 square yards].”

As for the participation of the Argentine experts in the identification work, Murillo Karam said that there are videotapes of the sessions in which from a universe of more than 60,000 bone fragments, the South American specialists determined, together with Mexican forensic experts, which ones would be sent to the University of Innsbruck for mitochondrial DNA testing.

Zerón de Lucio added that “at all the events at the River”, the Argentine experts were present, and there are images of them in the video that was released.

Zerón de Lucio confirmed that “there is not one sole piece of evidence of the Army’s involvement” in the disappearance of the normal school students, and he said that those who do not believe in the results of the investigations,