The death of Rodrigo Isidro, which occurred on November 14, begins to become clearer. The Tabasco Prosecutor’s Office reported that there are four police officers detained for murder linked to the shooting suffered by the student when he returned to his home in Villahermosa. The young man’s family had taken to the streets to protest to demand justice and ask the public prosecutor, Óscar Tonathiu Vázquez Landeros, to thoroughly investigate the officers who had chased Rodrigo Isidro in his vehicle when he returned home that night.
The Tabasco Prosecutor’s Office specified that the four detainees “were part of a state security company” and that there is sufficient data to accuse them of participation in the murder of the student. They are about to be made available to a judge, the agency specified in a statement in which they refer to the organization’s principle of zero impunity.
The veterinary student from the Autonomous University of Tabasco Juárez (UJAT) was returning home when he was ambushed by the police, who began chasing him and shooting at him. The young man crashed into a pole and lost his life. He had gunshot wounds to his chest, neck and hand. “My son was a good person, with many desires and projects. He had his own cattle, his own car, because since he was little he worked to have his own money,” his father, Lucio Isidro Álvarez, told the press, asking citizens not to be intimidated by the police, if they have information, and to tell what they saw that night.
Rodrigo Isidro’s family had publicly called, during repeated protests in Villahermosa over the past ten days, for a thorough investigation to be conducted and for the police officers who opened fire that night not to be protected. Furthermore, the victim’s father reported that the police had threatened residents of the area where the persecution took place not to give their testimony to the authorities. “We ask that there is no protection for anyone, that the governor intervenes so that this is not tainted, that a good investigation is carried out,” he said on Saturday in front of the media cameras, where he showed his rejection of the latest statements by the Secretary of Security and Protection of Citizens of Tabasco, Serafín Tadeo Lazcano, on corruption within the institution.
When Tadeo Lazcano went to the Tabasco Congress last week to report on security strategies, he was asked about citizens’ perception of the police, whom he accuses of corruption. However, the owner downplayed the allegations and stressed that there are mechanisms for citizens to lodge complaints against security officers. “It is not possible that the head of such an important agency, which must take care of citizens, is not aware of what is happening, of what its elements are doing,” Isidro Álvarez said.
