The Baja California State Attorney General’s Office confirmed Friday afternoon that 10 men and women were detained in connection with the shooting death of Tijuana photojournalist Margarito Martínez Esquivel last month.
Prosecutor Ricardo Iván Carpio Sánchez said that the operation was still underway early Friday morning when information about the arrests of five people was made public by Luis Cresencio Sandoval González, head of the National Defense Secretariat (SEDENA), during the morning briefing by Mexican President Andrés López Obrador.
Martínez, who covered crime and security in Tijuana, was shot to death on January 17 outside his home as he was leaving for work. A month earlier he had filed an official complaint about the threats he had received while working as a journalist and was in the process of applying for protection under a government program.
Carpio said that it has not been ruled out that the motive for the crime was related to Martínez’s journalistic work. He said investigators are working to confirm the identities and ages of the detainees, but some are reported to have criminal records. The official said the detainees are linked to an organized criminal group, but he declined to name that organization.
The arrests were made at dawn in Tijuana, during searches of six different properties, where authorities also seized an AR-15-style rifle, a Smith & Wesson pistol, phones and drugs, including cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine, according to Carpio and Sandoval. .
The weapons will be tested to determine if they were used in the murder or any other documented crime, officials said.
The arrests were based on information from a working group made up of several Mexican agencies, such as SEDENA, the federal prosecutor’s office, the military police, the Navy, and Baja California authorities.
Martínez’s mother, Eglantina Esquivel, arrived at the Prosecutor’s Office just as a press conference was ending this afternoon.
“We are here trying to find out the causes, reasons and reason why this happened, why they did it, by whose orders, because this was an order,” said Esquivel, responding to the news of the arrests. “(Margarito) did not kill a single spider (…) that’s why I want to know the cause, the reason, the reason.”
On Thursday, the day before the arrests, he had asked for justice for the murder of his son from a federal government official responsible for human rights.
The arrests took place in six homes, located in the neighborhoods of Camino Verde, Cuesta Blanca, Xicoténcatl Leyva, Anexa Sánchez Taboada and Sánchez Taboada. The addresses searched were possible “bases of operations” for the sale of drugs that were linked to the homicide by the investigative agencies.
Less than a week after Martínez’s murder, a second journalist from Tijuana, Lourdes Maldonado López, was shot dead in her car outside her home. Three suspects were arrested in connection with her murder on February 8.
Little information about the investigation has been released.