Last month Arturo Chávez Chávez, a former Chihuahua state prosecutor, was confirmed as Mexico’s new attorney general. A position dependant on the nomination of the President of the Republic but ratified by Senate. His nomination was deemed a triumph by the Secretary of Public Security, Genaro García Luna – rival to Eduardo Medina Mora, who resigned in early September.
Knowledge of his nomination sparked a great amount of controversy amongst the Senate and human rights activists. Questions of his nomination revolved around his poor investigative performance in the Juárez femicides in Chihuahua which lead to his formal recrimination by the National Human Rights Commission, the United Nations, and Amnesty International.
He is accused of mishandling investigations in the killings of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juárez in the 1990’s, falsifying evidence, and covering up murders. According to the New York Times, he was the top prosecutor from 1996 to 1998. A period plagued with an alarming number of women turning up dead or disappearing.
Chávez rejected the sentencing of multiple organizations defending human rights. He noted that his office convicted killers responsible for 32 of the 350 deaths during that period.
Sources:
“The Raging Storm over Mexico’s New Attorney General.” Frontera NorteSur. September 14,2009.
“Arturo Chávez en medio de la polémica.” El Economista. Septiembre 9, 2009.
To think that fellas like this are the tip of the iceberg makes me cringe. No wonder people here in Mexico feel impotent.