Four Months of Extortions in Mexico City: A Family Ravaged By Threats

Photo by: Cuartoscuro

By: Maribel F., Animal Político Reader | Translated by Valor for Borderland Beat

This is a wound that will never heal.

My family was extorted for months (from July to October 2015).  It’s a horrible feeling because you can’t go on with your life as before.  My dad lived in fear for us, because armed people would come to charge us at our house and store.

One day, my dad had the courage to go and denounce.  Fortunately, we were treated well by the authorities and two days later, one of them was able to be detained.  However, it was only one extortionist that was sent that day.  The main ones remain free, they work in a pink and red taxi and intimidate more people.

Finally, our store went bankrupt and my family separated for the good of us all.  My parents fled far away, the house was left abandoned.  The heritage of a lifetime was over.

The hearings and statements of the arrested person have been the scariest book I’ve read in my life.  You think about everything that you’ve lost, how some people change your life in days.  The pain never heals, the trauma remains; fear of being alone persists.  Habits changed, telephone numbers as well, we contact each other only when necessary.  The farther we are, the better.

Fear remains.

We want the other people to be detained because you don’t know at what point that they’re going to kidnap you or kill you. 

I’ve wondered if mourning would solve the entrenched feelings during those horrible days, but the answer is no, because I forgot how to cry, because I have to learn to live with the pain.

Source: Animal Político