Cerro Hueco Prison, Chiapas
December 23, 1997

CASE ONE: the community of Emiliano Zapata

Interviews with Miguel Montejo Penate (MMP), Voice of Cerro Hueco President & Juan Montejo Penate (JMP), Secretary.

MMP: 34; married; 5 children JMP: 38; married; 3 children

JMP: expressed the opinion that the prisoners of Cerro Hueco needed political solution to their unfair imprisonment as they couldn't rely on the judicial system for their release: "Here we are in prison, I wish they'd bring the others [Priistas--members of the ruling PRI party] in who are still out in the community: we're not accustomed to being here in prison--unjustly. We don't have anything; they only brought us here to the prison because we belong to an indigenous organisation: the support base FZLN [Frente Zapatista de Liberación Nacional]."

MMP: "Before, we never voted for either side." "I have five children, but I can't maintain them, no--one will look after them."

JMP: "I don't have a house or anything; I had a plot, but they took it from me [they burnt it down]." "They took my things out of the ejido [communal land]--I'm homeless."

MMP: "Our families are living with our father, far away."

JMP and MMP said that they worked on the ejido growing beans, corn and coffee. Their father had legal entitlement for his plot, but they [the sons] were landless. They approached a local rancher to negotiate the sale of a piece of land, which was authorised, through the government, in January 1995.

JMP: "It was good land, but it bothered other people when we tried to buy it."

MMP: "Everyone was in agreement, but the people of Emiliano Zapata weren't: Priistas... "

JMP: "Members of Paz y Justicia [paramilitary group]... We didn't have a party, we didn't vote for the PRI--the Priistas occupied the land without paying. Now the Priistas are threatening my son because he has the FZLN radios as well as the code containing the names of people and places [relevant to the local FZLN organisation]. They want to get hold of this information. By taking us out, they want to destroy the organisation, but we will not let them destroy it--the struggle will go on. They thought the organisation would collapse, but so far it hasn't. We continue to communicate with our companeros."

MMP: "We were the leaders."

JMP: "We worked as catechists, leading the mass and looking after the church organisation locally. Padre J. from Argentina [deported for political activities with two other priests in June 1995] was working here for 15 years before they kicked him out; he helped to organize us... we were organized well before 1994."

MMP: "Always organized."

JMP: "It's not true that he brought arms: rights and nothing else... so that we wouldn't go back to the slavery of before."

MMP: "And so that NAFTA wouldn't win."

JMP: "As for us, they accused us of various crimes: rebellion, kidnapping, injury and rape. No one saw us [committing these crimes], there weren't any witnesses. They arrested 37 people [in June '95]."

[Only 5 of this group remain in prison today. The Montejo Penate brothers were arrested on the same charges in January '96.]

MMP: "When they grabbed me we weren't in hiding."

MMP went on to explain that the problems began in March '95 when two Priistas quarrelled over land, leading to one of their deaths. "Thats when the fighting started, they tried to blame us [for his death]." During all of this, the Priistas murdered two zapatista sympathisers.

JMP: "It's now been a year and 10 months since we were unjustly imprisoned. They never arrested anyone from Paz y Justicia... We want you to pressure the government, to tell them that we have been unjustly imprisoned."

MMP: "We need solidarity in the New Year. No one has taken up this struggle yet."

JMP: "The authorities forced them [the alleged rape victims, Anita & Adela] to testify against us, it has also been said that they received money: 5,000 pesos each [$625]. We were planting beans and corn, we weren't in Emiliano Zapata. There were witnesses that day, but they were no good for our case: they were scared, there was an arrest warrant out on them as well. They went to another part of the ejido where they still are. They could have been attacked on the road."

MMP: "There were only 3 days to present the testimonies, but it takes at least 12 hours to get to Tuxtla. There were 4 witnesses, all of which were campesinos and members of the FZLN. Anita and Adela are relatives of ours."

JMP: "When Anita got sick, she would come to my house for help. She was my father's niece. She would visit him and they would support her. They are Priistas. We never threatened them; they were friends of ours. During the trial, Anita tried to come to testify six times, but they would not let her. The police commissioner did not allow them to come; he hid them. He forced them to sign [their affidavits]."

MMP: "They had to do it... "

JMP: "Their testimony was fabricated."

MMP: "[After the others were arrested], we continued to work. First, they captured Juan."

JJP: "My wife was sick; for the last year, her knee hurt; she couldn't even walk. I went to Tumbala [the nearest city] to look for medicine. At 9 a.m., 15 members of the Seguridad Publica [state security forces] and 10 Guardias Blancas [security forces of wealthy landowners] grabbed me behind a van."

MMP: "Eight days later, I left to check out the ranch that we were going to buy. As I walked through a gap, about 50 heavily-armed members of Seguridad Publica and Guardias Blancas detained me."

The two prisoners then talked about prison life and the prisoners' organization, The Voice of Cerro Hueco.

MMP: "At first, we were in a school room. The prisoners went on hunger strike, at first for 10 days, later for 3 months, only taking water. Before, the political prisoners were mixed with other prisoners; after these hunger strikes, they separated us."

JJP: "For food here, we mostly eat beans. If we manage to save a bit of money, we sometimes buy meat. But, as campesinos, we normally don't eat much chicken or pure meat; we normally eat vegetables. Here, we don't get vegetables or fruit. There aren't any beds here; we sleep on cardboard on the floor.

"Our families don't come very often; they don't have money for the trip. They've both come about three times. It takes 12 hours to get here; the transportation and hotel costs for the trip comes to about $100 per person. When they manage to save up some money from selling coffee from the ejido, they come. No one has helped us financially.

"The people who are working now in the community are pure priistas; the others fled. When they arrested me, Paz y Justicia told me that we couldn't come back. If we did, they'd kill us.

"We want our liberty. If we leave prison, I'm going to go to another place. I don't like these disputes. We want peace and the rule of law. And we want our liberty, because we are in prison unjustly--we didn't fight with anyone; we didn't take the land from anyone, not from the government, not from the priistas. We didn't commit any crime. That's why we want your support--we want you to help us get out of here."

MMP: "And we want there to be peace and tranquility here in Chiapas."

CASE TWO: Cerro Novo (in the municipality of Sabanilla)

Interviews with Mateo Alvarez Gutierrez (MAG), 55 years old; married; with six children.

Cresencio Alvarez Perez (CAP), says he believes that he's 25; the nephew of Mateo; married, with 2 children.

The two prisoners spoke partially in Spanish, partially in Ch'ol, with the aid of a fellow prisoner translating. The two are in prison along with a third family member, Sebastian Lopez Perez, on charges of kidnapping and damages.

CAP: I worked in the countryside, growing corn, rice, and beans, in an ejido.

MAG: Me too. There was a kidnapping, but it wasn't us that did it--others were guilty.

CAP: Sympathizers of the FZLN and the PRD in our community fought with members of the paramilitary group Paz y Justicia.

MAG: The kidnapping occured in our community. The person kidnapped was of a neighboring community, Chilun Cardenas. The other community accused us of the kidnapping.

CAP: Before the kidnapping, priistas killed my father.

MAG: "The guy who killed his father did so because of a land dispute. He was the same guy who was kidnapped--that's why they're accusing us of doing it in revenge. I don't know who the kidnappers were, but they were six people. They were priistas."

CAP: "We were arrested in the night. About 25 heavily-armed members of the Seguridad Publica and Paz y Justicia burst into our house. The three of us [the prisoners in the case] were sleeping. They destroyed the house and pulled it apart." MAG: "They beat everyone, including our wives and children. Then they tied our hands behind our backs, injuring our wrists."

CAP: "Our families had to leave the community for a year."

MAG: "And then they came back."

CAP: "They went to the neighborhood of San Antonio. They didn't have much and suffered a lot."

MAG: "They were very hungry there."

CAP: "Some companeros helped them out."

The men then resumed talking about their arrest.

CAP: "We were taken to the prosecutor's office in Tuxtla Gutierrez [the capital of Chiapas]. We got there at 4 a.m., and stayed there for four days. They beat me on my chest and back with the butts of their guns. Then they interrogated us. They told us to say that we were the kidnappers. We denied it.. How could we do such a thing?

"The prosecutor was there during the torture. They yelled obscenities at us; they called us 'murderers' and 'filthy Indians.' They told me that my 'mother was a whore,' and kept asking us 'why we were with that party,' 'why we got mixed up with the PRD.' The judge was also at the interrogation. No one ever told us that we had the right to have a lawyer present. There was no translator.

"Then we came here to Tuxtla. Abelardo [a prisoner and member of The Voice of Cerro Hueco, who has since been released from prison] translated for us as we made our affidavits. We had a public defender for a year, who made no progress on our case. He didn't inform us about what was happening; he just kept telling us that we would go free. Now, Miguel Angel de los Santos is our lawyer.

"Before [The Voice of Cerro Hueco], no one listened to us. We didn't have access to any help. That's why we formed this group, The Voice of Cerro Hueco, to ask for help for our appeals.

"We want you to help us. The judicial system doesn't work."

CASE THREE: Ricardo Garcia Hernandez

Ricardo Garcia Hernandez (RGH), age unknown (appears to be in his mid-30s), married with two daughters (Maria, age one, and Pabiana, age three), from Libertad Sonistie (Tila).

RGH: "They accused me of homicide. It happened on June 19, 1996. The PRI ambushed the perredistas [members of the opposition PRD party]. Before hand, the army came to remove the PRI [inhabitants of the town] to safety. The women of the PRI overheard the soldiers talking and warned the women of the PRD that there would be an attack by Paz y Justicia. So we left immediately to go to another community. My wife was scared--she didn't want to stay home. I was scared as well.

"We went to this other house [in the neighboring community], we weren't even dressed. My babies didn't have any clothes on, and they were getting bitten to death by mosquitoes. So my wife told me to go back to our home to get clothes for the baby.

"I went back to our community. There was no one there; the place was deserted. I went back to my home to get the clothes. Then I suddenly realized that the community was completley surrounded by soldiers. They came in to my house and asked me, 'Why are you taking these clothes? Where are you taking them?' There were lots of soldiers, along with the Seguridad Publica, Paz y Justicia, and armed civilians. My cousin, who belongs to Paz y Justicia, was with them. The soldiers interrogated me; then they detained me.

"It turns out that three priistas had been caught by mistake in a previous ambush and killed. A man, his wife, and his daughter. They hadn't been warned and had gone out on the road at 5 a.m thinking that it would be okay.

"The soldiers asked me who killed the man. I didn't say anything. I didn't know who did it. Then some members of Paz y Justicia told me that they knew that it wasn't me, but that it was one of my companeros. In every case, they look for people [to take the blame].

"I wasn't tortured my first day in detention. They asked me whether I was affiliated with the EZLN or the PRD, and I told them I didn't know anything about either group. One month earlier, in May, Bishop Raul Vera had come to our town. He baptized my daughter, Maria. So they asked me what the bishop had done to organize people to kill. They thought that the visit of the bishop had provoked the attack. I couldn't say this to them. The visit had only been to baptize two children and conduct one marriage ceremony.

"They made me walk down the road, with my hands tied behind my back, with the army. We passed by where the man had died. His body was still there. The others had disappeared. The Seguridad Publica made me look away as they didn't want me to see his body, but I managed to see it anyway.

"Five minutes later, the man's brother arrived. He asked the Seguridad Publica, 'What is going on? Why did you detain Ricardo? He didn't kill my brother. Ricardo is a good friend of mine; he's never had any problems with us. We're friends.' Then he named the person who had killed his brother right there in front of everybody. "But Paz y Justicia began to pressure him. Finally, he changed his story. Some legal representative was there, taking the man's testimony. They prepared some documentation there on the roadside and had him sign it. Then they took the body away.

"They took me away, down the highway. They detained me for a night in La Limar, in a church. At 8:00 p.m., the Seguridad Publica brought me in to make a declaration. Somebody questioned me--he didn't say who he was. I wasn't offered a lawyer. "They said, 'Tell us that you did it [murdered the three priistas]. Your companeros have already said that you did it and that you organized it. If you say something against your companeros we'll let you go.'

"But I said nothing. I told them that if they had detained companeros of mine I wanted to see them so that we could testify together. They said, 'No, it's too late for that, they've already told us that you did it.' So I didn't say anything.

"The next morning, someone who I thought was the prosecutor arrived by helicopter. He never spoke to me. Seguridad Publica ran in, bringing an old blue Seguridad Publica uniform with them. They made me take off my clothes and put on the uniform. I had been in the military before, from 1981-84. When I was grabbed my cousin told the soldiers that I had been in the army and that I was training the Zapatistas. I don't know why they put the uniform on me. Perhaps it was so they could say that I was in uniform when they caught me.

"They put me in the helicopter and took me to the prosecutor's office in Tuxtla. But before we got there we landed in the mountains outside Tuxtla. They gave me a pistol and told me to shoot it. I didn't want to, so they put it in my hand, raised my arm, and made me fire it once into the air.

"We went to the prosecutor's so I could make a declaration. I didn't have a lawyer; I still hadn't been offered one. They interrogated me.

"One of the dead man's daughters had survived [the ambush]. She was there. They asked her if I had done it. She didn't say a word; she just kept shaking her head. They put her against a wall. She didn't answer any of their questions. Then the Ministerio Publico took her behind the wall, so you could only see the top part of her. He hid behind the wall, took the hand of the girl and made her point it at me, indicating me [as the killer].

"I didn't declare anything. But the minister made me sign something. The brother [of the deceased] had made some sort of declaration, and I had to sign it. I was afraid.

"The next day, I was sentenced to 19 years."

CASE FOUR: Jorge Luis Mendez Mena

Interview with Jorge Luis Mendez Mena, 43 years old, of Primera de Enero (Salto de Agua), married to Angelica (36 years old), with five children.

"I lived in the colonia Primera de Enero, Salto de Agua, near Limar, Tila. I was accused of homicide, stealing livestock, and dispossession of land. These charges were pure fabrications.

"My father bought this site in the 1940s, from a German. It was part of a much larger ranch that the German owned. It was during the Second World War and German's couldn't own land in Mexico, so my father's purchase was never documented. I don't have any documents about it.

"The sons of the German then resold the land to a millionaire from Tila. For 43 years, I have lived on this land, but without documents. The new owner accused me of various crimes to try and get me off the land. My lawyer told me that this owner paid the Ministerio Publico to arrest me on charges of stealing livestock and dispossession of land.

"This was in November, 1993. But there weren't any witnesses. I spoke with a Father, who told me to go to the Human Rights Center in San Cristobal de las Casas. But I wasn't able to go.

"Then in January, 1994, the EZLN uprising began. Campesinos took over the rest of the ranch. But I didn't. And they left my land alone. They said, 'You are a poor man like us, so we will leave you in peace.' After this happened, I was accused again of the charges of stealing livestock and dispossession.

"As for the murder... There were two deaths. There was a dispute between campesinos. A group of campesinos took advantage of the uprising to take over the ranch, but the campesinos on the adjacent ranch were upset about the land seizure. The occupying campesinos went to negotiate with the neighboring campesinos and came to an agreement about where the boundaries of the ranch would be. The next day they were returning to the neighboring ranch to talk to the campesinos about measuring individual plots when they started shooting at them from the house. They couldn't believe it as they had been really friendly to them the day before. Someone had paid the paramilitaries among the neighboring campesinos to attack.them. During the confrontation--the campesinos returned fire when they were attacked--a person in the house was killed. Another person who was on his way to bathe was also killed.

"During all this, I was working on a construction crew on the Salto de Agua road, five kilometers away. I wasn't involved in the follow up discussions as an agreement about my land had been reached the day before. At 2 p.m., I returned to my house to have lunch. My wife was crying, frightened. I shut us up in the house and stayed there for about three days. Nothing happened. I went to check on my livestock, but a woman who worked on the ranch told me not to go to the corral because the family of the dead man had robbed all my live stock and were slicing up my bull--I lost 7 million pesos.

"I was detained in January of 1997, by 10 members of the Seguridad Publica, 5 members of Paz y Justicia, and 2 members of the Poder Ejecutivo.

CASE FIVE: Los Moyos

Interview with Guadalupe Hernandez Jimenez.

Guadalupe is 26, married, with a two-year-old and a three-year-child.

Carmelo Perez Lopez (40, married, with five children), Salvador Yanez and Carmelo Cruz Gomez are also in prison in connection with this case. All four men belong to the FZLN.

GHJ: "In June 1996, Paz y Justicia kidnapped four companeros. They were beaten. They were forced to spend two nights in water, without food."

After this kidnapping, a priista was kidnapped, allegedly in retribution. Guadalupe and the other three men were arrested for the second kidnapping.

"We hadn't gotten into problems [with Paz y Justicia]. The companero who accused us had been with us before. The people who actually did the [second] kidnapping weren't members of the Frente--as members of the organisation we have a certain discipline. We never fabricate charges--but Paz y Justicia does.

"There was no proof offered. The person who was allegedly kidnapped never made a statement.

"The Seguridad Publica came to my house, and asked me to go to another house so we could talk about the kidnapping. I didn't mind as I had done nothing wrong, so I went with them. Then they arrested me.

"The police told me to tell them the truth, or they'd kill me. I said I didn't know anything. So they beat me with the butts of their rifles, on my chest and kept hitting my ears. They took us to Sabanilla and hid us in the car, wrapped in their police coats as they didn't want other members of the FZLN to see that they'd arrested us. They told us that they were going to kill us.

"On June 15, 1996, the FZLN marched in Los Moyos to protest our innocence and to call for our release. Paz y Justicia attacked them during the march and killed two people.

"My family has not yet visited me. They are refugees now.

"We ask for your collaboration, if you can help in any way to secure our freedom. We are innocent. We are only prisoners of the opposition. We have the names of the murderers, who right now are sitting at home peacefully.

"We thank you for your help, because we've done everything we can to get out of here. We've gone on hunger strike and sent out petitions, but the government doesn't pay any attention."