Case of the Three Dead Rabbits Highlights Absurdity of Mexican Justice System Nina Lakhani - The Guardian
go to original August 22, 2016

Local councilor Heliodoro Morales Mendoza, third right, was at work when four armed police officers arrested him in front of his colleagues. Denied bail, he faces up to 10 years in prison. (Handout)

Heliodoro Morales Mendoza was at work in the municipal offices of the small Mexican town where he lives, when four armed police officers burst in and arrested him in front of his colleagues.

Morales was denied bail and has been held in pre-trial detention for seven months; he is facing up to 10 years in prison.

His alleged offense is not corruption, kidnapping, drug trafficking or involvement with the many criminal factions which have unleashed bloodshed across the country.

The case highlights the absurdity and inequity of a justice system in which less than 1% of crimes are punished; a system in which drug capos can repeatedly escape from high-security prisons and politicians can face credible allegations of money-laundering or drug trafficking with little consequence, yet prisoners accused of minor crimes can languish in overcrowded prisons for months – or even years.

Morales, from the mostly indigenous Zapotec town of Tlacolula de Matamoros in the southern state of Oaxaca, was arrested in January. He was charged under legislation governing serious crimes against biodiversity, which his lawyers say is intended to protect endangered species like jaguars and pumas.

The charge may be unusual, but his prolonged pre-trial detention is not: more than 100,000 prisoners – about 41% of the total prison population – have been refused bail while their cases drag through the notoriously slow system.

Read the rest at The Guardian

Related: Mexico Justice System: Need to Rebuild Public Prosecutor System from Ground Up (Mexico Voices)

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