Mexico: Impunity High as Femicide Memorial Remembers Victims

A traveling installation of red shoes on violence against women made a stop in the state of Quintana Roo, whose women’s shelter was recently closed down, while a new report shows that only 1 percent of cases of sexual violence against women is actually investigated by police across Mexico.

Mexican artist Elina Chauvet originally conceived of the piece as a way of shedding light on gender-related violence in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua — the red shoes representing the missing women. ‘Red shoes’ has also inspired reproductions in Ecuador, the United States, Italy and Spain.

The Women’s Attention Center, CIAM, in Quintana Roo replicated the piece this week with dozens of shoes, all donated and painted red, in front of three public sites.

RELATED: Mexico: 7 Femicides Each Day, 63 Percent of Women Face Gender Violence

Last week, two women were killed in the southeastern state, and a total of 150 women since 2012. State government requested that the federal government issue a statewide alert of gender-based violence.

“We see that violence is still increasing,” CIAM-Cancún director Paola Feregrino told Cimacnoticias. “Since the CIAM shelter closed, in which we treated about 150 women every month, we don’t know where these women are and where they could receive the comprehensive service that we gave them in the shelter.”

RELATED: Mexican State Issues 'Gender Alert' to Address Femicide

Femicides are considered homicide under state law.

About one percent of sexual aggressors are indicted in Mexico, according to a study released Monday by the Executive Commission for the Care of Victims. Public servants only report half of the cases, of which 40 percent are committed against minors under 15.