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Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

Could a high-profile murder be a turning point for gender violence in Mexico?

The disappearance and suspected murder of Debanhi Escobar in Nuevo León got President López Obrador’s attention. But will the public pressure be enough to spur the government into taking substantial action to curb violence against women in Mexico?

MEXICO CITY (CN) — The case went viral on social media and sparked protests across Mexico. The disappearance of 18-year-old Debanhi Escobar in early April came amid a rash of similar tragedies in several states, and citizens both online and in the streets demanded answers.

Debanhi went missing in the early morning hours on Apr. 9 after a night out with friends. Her body was discovered two weeks later in a cistern at a hotel in a suburb of Monterrey, Nuevo León. It was the fifth time authorities had searched the hotel grounds. 

Her father, Mario Escobar, took over her Instagram account on the day of her disappearance. It now has over 625,000 followers. 

One of the photos he posted became a haunting emblem for the gender violence crisis in Mexico. Taken by the taxi driver who is the last person known to have seen her alive, the photo shows Debanhi alone in the middle of the night on a stretch of road so dangerous it has come to be known as “the highway of the dead.”

Escobar’s social media activism for his daughter is one reason Debanhi’s case has garnered so much attention, according to Daniela Villegas, a researcher at the Center for Gender Research and Studies at Mexico’s National Autonomous University. 

Another is the failure of Nuevo León Governor Samuel García to fulfill his promise to combat violence against women. “If you mess with a woman, you mess with all of Nuevo León,” he promised on the campaign trail.

“People have ‘messed with’ so many women, and he hasn’t done anything about it,” said Villegas. 

Debanhi Escobar looks down a road known as "the highway of the dead" on the night she went missing. Taken by the taxi driver who is the last person known to see her alive, this photo became a symbol for Mexico’s feminist movement. (Instagram via Courthouse News)

There is the case of María Fernanda Contreras Ruiz, 27, who disappeared on Apr. 3 and was confirmed dead on Apr. 9, the same day Debanhi went missing. Yolanda Martínez Cadena disappeared on Mar. 31; her father continues to search for her. 

And there are countless others. The newspaper Reforma reported 80 women went missing across Mexico in the 13 days that authorities searched for Debanhi. 

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has also been the target of criticism for not doing enough to combat the problem.

“The federal government has very little interest in dealing with the problem of violence against women,” said Silvia Chuc of the women’s rights group Gobernanza MX. Her state of Quintana Roo has registered the highest rate of violence against women in the country since 2021. 

“We see from our tracking at Gobernanza MX that levels of violence against women are rising across the country, despite the federal government’s discourse that it isn’t happening,” she said.

While the president attributes the rise in murders and other types of violence against women to the “neoliberal” administrations of his predecessors, government data reveal that femicide reached record highs during the first half of his term. 

On Tuesday, the president announced he would address the problem every Thursday in his morning press conference. The first installment of his new segment titled “Zero Impunity” on Thursday featured deputy security secretary Ricardo Mejía Berdeja listing off arrests of suspects accused of violence against women and journalists

Villegas said this communication in and of itself is likely to do little to help curb the violence. 

“They surely presented those arrests as an immediate response to the problem, but the president’s messaging day-to-day hasn’t been enough, hasn’t been clear,” she said. “We need more forcefulness, because this is a national emergency.”

While neoliberalism in itself doesn’t fully explain the extreme levels of violence against women in Mexico, the president is correct in stating the problem did not begin with his administration.

“This situation has gone on for decades,” said Villegas, who traced the issue back to the wave of femicides in Ciudad Juárez in the 1990s. The problem only worsened after Felipe Calderón, elected president in 2006, declared a “war on drugs” at the beginning of his term. Villegas now describes the problem as a type of terrorism on younger generations of Mexicans.

“We have all this that we’re dragging behind us from the past, plus the new problems of today. It’s truly an uncontrollable situation,” she said.

Debanhi Escobar poses in a photo posted to her Instagram account. Taken over by her father after her disappearance, the account helped her case garner a lot of media attention, putting more pressure on the government to take action on the issue of violence against women in Mexico. (Instagram via Courthouse News)

Mariana Limón Rugerio, an independent journalist and author of a weekly newsletter focusing on issues of gender violence and equality, likewise expressed a despondent view of the issue. 

“All cases of femicide should shock us and they should all be turning points,” she said. “I don’t think the situation will change, because there isn’t deep reflection about the problem. We’re not understanding that violence against women is linked to organized crime and the process of militarization that began in 2006 and which every presidential administration since has kept in place.”

Critics of López Obrador have called out his proliferation of the militarization begun by his predecessors, even giving the military the responsibility of constructing his megaprojects like the new Mexico City airport and the Maya Train

“Until we see a change in the discourse on the issue at the municipal, state and national levels, and we start talking about an agenda of peace that considers the vulnerability of girls and women, there won’t be a turning point,” Limón said. 

Although it likely won’t be a problem-solving turning point in Mexico’s decadeslong struggle with violence against women, the attention to Debanhi’s case could be viewed as another step in the right direction. 

Villegas, the academic, highlighted that this case has helped raise awareness for Mexico’s feminist movement, as well as to bring its demands to the political table. 

Chuc, the activist, said she hopes Debanhi’s case continues to motivate women to organize across the country.

“There have been high-profile cases in the past without causing major change,” she said. “What this could trigger is more organization by the women of Nuevo León.”

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