• Live
    • Audio Only
  • google plus
  • facebook
  • twitter
News > Latin America

Mexico Mulls 90-Year Jail Time for Forced Disappearance Crimes

  • People hold a Mexican flag during a demonstration to demand information on the 43 missing students of the Ayotzinapa teachers' training college.

    People hold a Mexican flag during a demonstration to demand information on the 43 missing students of the Ayotzinapa teachers' training college. | Photo: Reuters

Published 23 April 2017
Opinion

The Senate is expected to vote on the reform next week, after months of work by human rights organizations.

Perpetrators could be handed a sentence of up to 90 years in prison for the crime of enforced disappearances in Mexico if a bill up for debate passes into law.

RELATED:
Mexico: 30,000 Disappeared, 855 Mass Graves Found in 9 Years

The bill proposes that any person will face 75 years in prison for forcibly disappearing another, but in the case that a public servant who commits the crime, the perpetrator will get 90 years.

The draft legislation also proposed strong sanctions for those who hide or destroy human remains, as well as for people who ignore this type of crime and allow it to go unreported or investigated. The bill sets penalties of up to 20 years in prison for those who carry out or collaborate in the destruction of human remains.

The sanctions may increase if the victim is a minor, a woman, a person with a disability, a migrant, a journalist or a human rights defender, among others. Reductions of the sentences will be given if information on the whereabouts of the victim are given in the first ten days after the crime.

One of the elements of the bill also includes penalties for those who hurt a baby born from a victim of enforced disappearance, such as what happened in cases of forced disappearances during the dictatorship in Argentina when members of the military kidnapped infants and children and raised them as their own.

RELATED:
If You Want to Murder a Journalist in Mexico, Chances Are You'll Get Away With It

The importance of the debate looms large after a new report recently found that at least 30,000 people have gone missing in Mexico in the past nine years. The report also found that Mexico is home to a staggering 855 mass graves.

The first draft was drawn up a year and a half ago, and lawmakers and social organizations have pressured authorities to accelerate the proposal and work on tackling impunity. According to the Mexican newspaper La Jornada, the bill is viewed favorably in the Senate.

Violence in Mexico has spiked during the past year to the highest rates since 2011 and the worst during the presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto, who took office in late 2012.

Comment
0
Comments
Post with no comments.