The Mercedes Prosecutor's Office No. 3 is investigating the murder of Sofía Santillán. The young woman was found by her transgender friends in the city's urban area, very close to where she had last been seen on Friday. The autopsy results were released today. Photo: courtesy of Noticias Mercedinas. Sofía Santillán was found dead yesterday afternoon by her transgender friends. Her body was lying in some tall grass, very close to where she had last been seen on Friday, December 23, at the corner of 6th and 21st Streets, in the urban area of ​​Mercedes, Buenos Aires Province. The Prosecutor's Office No. 3 of that city is in charge of the investigation. "According to the autopsy results, the young woman was killed by a blow to the head. There were no traces of gunshot wounds or cuts on her body," they informed Presentes . "We assume, based on the state of decomposition of the body, that she died on Friday. We are working on identifying the perpetrator," they said. The prosecutor's office—headed by Pedro Illanes, with Sebastián Fedulio as secretary—already has some information about who might be the young woman's killer. Currently, they are conducting investigative work at the scene of the discovery, along with the Scientific Police and forensic doctors, and are analyzing how to classify the events: whether as aggravated homicide due to gender-based violence, sexual orientation, and/or if other factors were involved in the crime.

The last time they saw her

Sofía was known as Colo. She worked as a prostitute and often walked around the same area where she was found murdered, near a car dealership, with her friends. They didn't notice her absence until yesterday, when her body was found in a vacant lot in the city, on land adjacent to the railway sheds, a few meters from the Sarmiento train line station (which goes to Once station). "We thought she had gone with her boyfriend, who is a truck driver and travels everywhere, to spend Christmas. Since she wasn't answering her calls, we thought her cell phone battery had died. But when we spoke to him and learned they weren't together, we got worried," a source told [the news outlet]. Presents A colleague who asked to remain anonymous. Yesterday, Monday, they decided to go looking for her, and they walked around the area where they had said goodbye on Friday at 10:30 p.m. "Take care," Sofía had told her when one of the colleagues got into a car. "You too," she replied, the same colleague who, while walking, smelled a sour odor in the air and minutes later, following that scent, found her dead. They all shared information about who they had last seen Sofía with. The details they were able to piece together point to the same person, now the prime suspect.

"Sofia's death will not go unpunished."

It was the trans women who broke the news to Sofía's family, who live in Azul. They are still reeling from the shock of the discovery. They are afraid, but they say, "Sofía's death won't go unpunished. We're figuring out how to organize." Mercedes is a city of 60,000 inhabitants, located 100 kilometers east of Buenos Aires. "It's a very conservative and traditional city, but it's only recently begun to change its societal paradigm. A recent ordinance suspended beauty pageants. The human rights department is working extensively on gender issues and against femicides; and there are organizations like Mujeres en Vuelo (Women in Flight) that also do important work. For Mercedes, this crime is a significant event; it's not a city accustomed to violence, murders aren't frequent, although there have been some in recent years," said Cristian Falabella, editor of Noticias Mercedinas, a local news outlet. Two months ago, an incident of institutional violence occurred in that town, little known even to the residents of Mercedes: the police used rubber bullets to repress transgender and transvestite sex workers. The municipality intervened to guarantee their rights and reached out to about ten women. Sofía was one of them. The officer who had committed the violence was removed from his post. From then on, some lines of action were established, and a space for dialogue was opened with the transgender and transvestite community of Mercedes. While some support interventions were implemented, the ultimate goal was to create employment opportunities for this population, but to date, for various reasons, this remains an outstanding issue.

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