Mexico Arrest Priest For Student Murder

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

The Mexico City Police reported the arrest on Wednesday night of a priest who is accused of being the alleged murderer of Hugo Leonardo Avendaño, a young university student who disappeared on June 11.

The body of the 29-year-old was found two days later in a vehicle of the Tlalpan delegation, south of the Mexican capital. Incredibly, the captured priest was the same one who officiated the present body mass of the deceased, as confirmed by multiple local sources.

Ernestina Godoy, head of the Capital Prosecutor's Office, confirmed the capture of the subject who was initially identified as Francisco “N”. The official also reported that in the case of the master's student at the Intercontinental University "there was no kidnapping" and that there was only one complaint for disappearance.

For his part, Telediario MX identified the detainee as Father Francisco Javier Bautista, who is affiliated with the Cristo Salvador parish in Tlalpan. The source released a video showing the protest and march that nearly 200 parishioners led this Wednesday outside the parish demanding the release of the priest and evidence of connection to the case.

In a chilling interview carried out the day the mass was celebrated in honor of Avendaño, the priest spoke to the media saying: "It is a community that is very moved because they are things that, well, are being done as daily, right?".

The night of his disappearance, Avendaño sent a text message to his brother saying that he would go to Cristo Salvador parish to meet with Bautista. The student and the pastor met in a church for a few hours and then left for the colony where the victim's body was later found. Video cameras captured the movement of both, each leaving the temple, each in his car.

That same night, the parish priest left the area where the body was found to go to the Mexico City International Airport, according to Expansión.com.

For now the authorities presume that it is a homicide and that there is no more elaborate plan behind the crime.

The murder of Hugo Leonardo Avendaño is added to the death of Norberto Ronquillo, another university student from Chihuahua who died on June 6 after he was kidnapped and despite the fact that his family did not report to the authorities and paid his reward.

Mexico City has registered from January to April an increase of 237.5% in kidnappings compared to the first four months of 2018, according to official sources in the capital.