In Mexico, people march for the transfemicides of Aline and Fabiola
Aline Sánchez, 41, was murdered in her apartment in Mexicaltzingo, State of Mexico (Edomex), on July 19. 400 kilometers away, in the city of San Luis Potosí, Fabiola Rivera, 43, was murdered in her beauty salon in the early morning of July 21.
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Aline Sánchez, 41, was murdered in her apartment in Mexicaltzingo, State of Mexico (Edomex), on July 19. 400 kilometers away, in the city of San Luis Potosí, Fabiola Rivera, 43, was murdered in her beauty salon in the early morning of July 21. Family, friends, and activists took to the streets in each city, demanding justice.
Six days after the transfemicide of Aline, her family and activists are demanding that the Attorney General's Office launch an investigation and apply the National Protocol for Personnel of Law Enforcement Agencies in cases involving sexual orientation or gender identity , which came into effect in 2018. In San Luis Potosí, they are demanding that the transfemicide of Fabiola be investigated under the same protocol and that trans women be included in the Law on Women's Access to a Life Free of Violence.
Because of the brutality with which Aline and Fabiola's lives were taken, activists also demand that investigations adhere to the classification of hate crime based on sexual orientation and gender identity, grounds that the Penal Code of the State of Mexico and San Luis Potosí contemplates in its article 241 and 144, respectively.
The murders of Aline and Fabiola are part of a wave of deadly violence in Mexico, where six other trans women have been killed in different states in just two weeks. Justice is demanded for all of them.
The State of Mexico prosecutor's office does not investigate
On July 20, the day after Aline was murdered, the State of Mexico Congress approved reforms allowing transgender people to legally change their birth certificates . That same day, activists learned of her murder.
“We were in shock. It’s very sad because our sister Aline, from her own corner, was always supporting this fight (the gender identity law). It makes me angry that her life was taken in this way, with such cruelty and violence, so much so that they even killed one of her dogs with a single blow. It saddens me that legal justice couldn’t be served because she’s gone with the name she never identified with, but that doesn’t mean the authorities shouldn’t apply the protocol (mentioned earlier) because this was a hate crime, a transfemicide, and we demand justice,” said Tanya Vázquez, activist and member of Mujeres Trans Famosas Toluca .
Vázquez's specific demand is echoed by Aline's family, who say that after a week the Prosecutor's Office has neither gathered information nor carried out the necessary investigations at the site where Aline was murdered. Furthermore, they fear for their safety.
“So far, no one has been arrested. We don't want to hinder the prosecution, but we don't want them to let time take its course. We fear for our safety because we are a family that takes it upon itself to face these kinds of situations head-on. We fear for our safety and we don't want this to go unpunished,” Aline's brother explained during a press conference.
Presentes managed to contact the Prosecutor's Office after several attempts. When they questioned the status of the investigation and the use of protocol regarding Aline's murder, they responded using her deadname (the name she was given at birth) and added, without providing further details, "we are working on it." To date, no press release from the Prosecutor's Office has addressed this crime or the progress of the investigation.
Vázquez announced that if there is no progress in the investigation there will be demonstrations in Toluca and other municipalities in the State of Mexico.
“This failed government is not taking action to prevent, eradicate, and punish this type of behavior stemming from machismo that devalues us, and enough is enough. We will not remain silent; our lives matter, our lives count,” she asserted in an interview.
Aline, “cheerful and a social activist” from Mexicaltzingo
San Mateo Mexicaltzingo is a municipality located in the State of Mexico, which geographically surrounds the country's capital. Its inhabitants simply call it Mexicaltzingo, which in Nahuatl means "place where distinguished Mexicans live," and Aline certainly lived up to that meaning.
“Aline was greatly admired in the municipality for everything she contributed. She is an LGBT and trans symbol within Mexicaltzingo because she was one of the first people to come out without fear, and her brother and family always defended her,” a source who preferred to remain anonymous told Presentes.
This same perception is shared by a friend of Aline's who told Presentes: “Everyone knows who Aline is and what she did for the LGBT community and people with addiction problems. She is a tireless social activist; her dream was to open an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) group especially for LGBTQ+ people. She also spread her joy everywhere she went; she was a great Ninel Conde impersonator… her favorite song was 'El Bombón Asesino' (The Killer Bombshell ).”
On the afternoon of July 21, she was laid to rest by her family, friends, activists, and hundreds of people who knew her from Mexicaltzingo and surrounding municipalities. During the procession, family members and transgender women carried her coffin, waved rainbow flags, played her favorite song and mariachi music, and shouted “Justice for Aline!”
The prosecution is revictimizing Fabiola. The press is calling it a “crime of passion.”
The day Aline was laid to rest in the city of San Luis Potosí, in north-central Mexico, Fabiola Rivera was murdered in her beauty salon. She was 41 years old, and according to reports from the Attorney General's Office, her body showed stab wounds. In their statement, the authorities initially referred to Fabiola using male pronouns, and later as "a person who identified as female in the civil registry." Despite having her birth certificate amended, they never referred to Fabiola as a woman.
Martín Ortiz, a friend of Fabiola, learned of his friend's murder after seeing a video from a local media outlet that described the murder as a "crime of passion".
“It was very shocking. I had seen her just on Sunday at the bar celebrating her birthday. She really enjoyed what she did, her independence, and her death was aggressive, a hate crime, a transphobic one. It's not an isolated incident because being a woman in this country already puts you in danger, and now being a trans woman carries even more symbolic burdens of discrimination, many offenses, and lost opportunities. Society in San Luis Potosí thinks trans women are a joke; they depersonalize them, stripping them of their humanity. This wave of violence motivated by hate and transphobia is shocking because we're not a big enough city for this number of cases to occur so frequently. That's why it dismays and worries us, and treating it as a crime of passion would strip Fabiola of her victimhood,” Martín commented in an interview with Presentes.
Like him, activists in San Luis Potosí also denounced the symbolic violence perpetrated by the Prosecutor's Office and the press for not respecting Fabiola's gender identity and demanded that the case be investigated and that the aggravating circumstance of hate crime be applied.
“It’s our time, trans people, for the aggressors to be afraid, for the State to be afraid, and never again for us,” commented Vanessa Hernández, a trans activist.
They demand justice and an end to transphobia.
Following the prosecutor's investigation, various LGBT groups organized a demonstration on Friday, July 23. The march was attended by approximately 200 people, including family members, friends, acquaintances, activists, and transgender women from the city.
During the demonstration, the two main slogans were “Justice for Fabiola!” and “No more transphobia!” The march culminated at the Attorney General's Office of San Luis Potosí, where the protesters entered the building, demanded the Attorney General's resignation, and set up a memorial on the steps with candles, trans flags, and photographs of Fabiola.
“A month ago we marched to celebrate diversity, and exactly one month later we took to the streets out of social frustration, where brands don't support us, the only thing that accompanies us is the pain, the pain of losing a friend but also of losing all those trans women because of hate and because it could have been any one of us,” Martín said in an interview.
After ten minutes, José Castillo emerged representing the Prosecutor's Office and stated that he was in charge of the investigation into Fabiola's transphobic murder. "The investigation has made significant progress, and I am here to commit to all of you that justice will be served," he affirmed.
The activists claimed that at least three other transgender women have been murdered in San Luis Potosí and that justice has not been served in any of the cases. The protest concluded with the creation of a commission made up of activists and family members to follow up on the investigations. Martín told Presentes that at the meeting, the prosecutor pledged to address the crime with a gender perspective and said that his team was trained to do so. “We won’t let this go; we will remain vigilant to pressure the authorities and ensure that justice is done,” Martín added.
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