La Linea Claims Responsibility For El Diario Killing

A narco banner has appeared in Ciudad Juarez claiming responsibility for the murder of a photographer near the offices of El Diaro. The message also threatens to attack police by name.

“The same thing that happened to the journalists will happen to you if we don't get the money back”

The officers mentioned are federal agents.

“Commandante Diaz Savedra, Commisario Pavon, Commandante Aries, the same thing that happened to the journalists will happen to you if we don't get the money back. You guys are no better than Mayer Resendiz"

- La Linea

La Linea is the armed wing of the Juarez Cartel which has been at war for some time with the El Chapo and the Sinaloa cartel. It has been rumored that the city police are mainly loyal to La Linea while the federal police and the army may have ties with El Chapo.

Murdered El Diaro Intern May Not Have Been Intended Target
by Adriana Gómez Licón / El Paso Times

JUÁREZ - The El Diario photography intern shot and killed Thursday may not have been the intended target of the attack, the Chihuahua human-rights investigator said Friday.

Gustavo de la Rosa Hickerson who lives in El Paso and works in Juárez said the vehicle the victim, Luis Carlos Santiago, was driving belongs to his son, Alejo de la Rosa, who is Santiago's best friend.
Santiago, 21, was killed by gunmen Thursday afternoon outside a busy mall in north Juárez. He was a photography intern at El Diario about to become a staff member Monday. Another intern, Carlos Manuel Sánchez, was wounded in the attack and survived.

De la Rosa Hickerson said his son gave Santiago the keys to his car so they could go eat after a workshop at the newspaper's offices. They ate at Santiago's home with his common-law wife and it is unknown what they were doing at the Río Grande Mall.

De la Rosa Hickerson said a gun man shot Santiago from the front of the car. Then, Santiago tried to drive in reverse and got stuck in parked cars. Other gunmen shot at the pair from behind, he said.
Sánchez, shot four times, got out of the vehicle and ran toward the mall. He collapsed and was later sent to the hospital.

Santiago was close to de la Rosa Hickerson's family.

"Many people think that Luis Carlos (Santiago) was my son," de la Rosa Hickerson said. "It is a likely theory that my son was targeted. I wish it were not true, but I hope police investigate in depth." De la Rosa Hickerson said he has been threatened in the past for speaking up about human rights abuses by the Mexican Army. "My job has become extremely difficult," he said.

De la Rosa Hickerson was detained five days in October by Customs and Border Protection in El Paso. He complained that border agents arrested him unfairly for saying he was afraid to be in Juárez when they were conducting a "credible fear interview."

De la Rosa Hickerson said Santiago belonged to a group of friends who liked poetry, anime and alternative music. Santiago became an orphan when he was a teenager and became good friends of de la Rosa Hickerson's family.

"He was looking for the cozy warmth of home," he said.

Santiago used to visit de la Rosa Hickerson's farm in the Valley of Juárez.

De la Rosa Hickerson said Santiago and his son were just discovering their passion for journalism. They were thinking about moving to Mexico City to work for a national newspaper.

His death saddened many media professionals.

Some reporters and photographers were covering Santiago's wake Friday. Others were there to mourn his death. And some were crying while taking notes.

"It is terrible. I feel powerless," said Juán de Dios Olivas, an El Diario reporter.
Olivas and at least 20 other fellow journalists of El Diario stood next to the coffin in tribute. The editor of newspaper, Pedro Torres, said Santiago "was part of the team even if he had only been there for a short time."

Torres reminded people about Armando Rodríguez, another reporter who was killed in November 2008. Rodríguez was the police reporter and had received numerous threats before he was slain outside his home in front of his daughter.

"We are not going to stop pushing for answers," Olivas said.

But de la Rosa Hickerson said 95 percent of the murder investigations don't result in arrests.

More than 6,400 people have been killed since 2008 when drug cartels began fighting a bloody war. Nearly 2,200 murders have occurred this year. Friday started out deadly at a bar.

Gunmen arrived at the V-Bar in the Pronaf area and killed eight people about 4 a.m. Pronaf is a bar strip in north Juárez.

State police said a woman in her 20s, a man in his 20s and six other men in their 30s were killed.

On Friday, police only identified León Cabral Martínez, 35, who died in the hospital Friday morning. The rest died at the scene. Another woman was wounded but survived the gunfire.