Aquila Mayor and Autodefensa Leader Arrested

Juan Hernández Ramírez (left) & La Tuta

 By: Ernesto Martínez Elorriaga & Enrique Méndez | Translated by Valor for Borderland Beat

The Attorney General’s Office of Michoacán obtained a detention order against the mayor of Aquila, Juan Hernández Ramírez, and the leader of the autodefensas of Huahua, José Antioco Calvillo García, after having obtained evidence about their alleged involvement in the crimes of attempted aggravated homicide and of covering up the crime.

Semeí Verdía Zepeda

Through a statement, the state agency found that there is sufficient evidence from the public prosecutor to determine a detention order against the PRI mayor and his accomplice for their alleged responsibility in the events that occurred on December 16, 2014, and on May 25 and 26, 2015, in which the Nahua autodefensa leader of Ostula, Semeí Verdía Zepeda, was attacked.

José Antioco, who was part of the autodefensa movement, reported the movements made by Semeí Verdía to the mayor of Aquila, who in return gave him money.  It was reported that the mayor offered two million pesos ($129,223) to a criminal group to kill the Nahua leader.

The leader of the autodefensas of Huahua and the mayor of Aquila “had meetings on several occasions in Maruata and Aquila, with members of organized crime in order to plan the assassination of Semeí Verdía, recalling the recruitment of six people identified as Rigoberto Mejía Valdovinos, Argel Mejía Valdovinos, Ramiro Álvarez Medina, Christian David García de Asís and Victorino Mejía, who were offered two million pesos after the job was executed and were paid seven thousand pesos ($452) in advance”.

Sources: La Jornada, La Jornada