'Bravest Woman in Mexico' Sees Her Story on Stage Alexis Soloski - The New York Times
go to original April 18, 2013

Marisol Valles Garcia, second from right, former police chief of the Mexican town Praxedis G. Guerrero, accompanied by playwright Paul Olmos, left, her sister Miriam Garcis, and her attorney Carlos Spector, right, gives a news conference in New York's La Mama Theater, Monday, April 15, 2013. (Richard Drew/AP)

Until last week, Marisol Valles García, a petite, soft-spoken 23-year-old with rather severe rectangular glasses, had never visited New York, never ridden in an elevator, never dined in an Italian restaurant. And she had never seen a play.

But on Sunday, she attended “so go the ghosts of mexico, part one,” a drama by Matthew Paul Olmos at La MaMa E.T.C. and based on her life. In a program note, Mr. Olmos calls it “a poetic impression of what Marisol did for her country.”

In 2010, Ms. Valles, then just 20, accepted the position of police chief of Práxedis Guadalupe Guerrero, a small town in northern Mexico. Ms. Valles, a criminology student, had originally applied for a secretarial position in the department, but after the decapitation of the former police chief, no one volunteered for the top job, and she agreed to take it, earning the media sobriquet “the bravest woman in Mexico.”

But at a news conference on Monday morning at La MaMa, seated alongside her lawyer and her older sister, Ms. Valles appeared very shy. Speaking through a translator, she quietly described her experience watching the play:
“It was very difficult for me to relive and see enacted on the stage many of the situations that happened, many of the deaths.”

Read the rest at The New York Times

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