Morelos Prosecutor Uriel Carmona. Photo: Google

By KELIN DILLON

On Monday, Nov. 7, Mexican anti-corruption officials and Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum accused the Morelos Attorney General’s Office of covering up the murder of 27-year-old Ariadna López, whose lifeless body was found on a highway in Morelos last week.

López reportedly disappeared from the Mexican capital’s trendy Condesa neighborhood on the evening of Oct. 30 after meeting friends, and her body was found on the side of a highway in the nearby state of Morelos just two days later by passing cyclists.

Following the body’s discovery, the Morelos Attorney General’s Office declared López to have died from alcohol intoxication and choking on her own vomit; however, a secondary autopsy held at the request of López’s family concluded that the young woman was killed by multiple force trauma, with Mexico City officials claiming to have proof that the young woman lost her life to homicide by the very friends she went to meet within the capital itself.

For his part, Morelos state prosecutor Uriel Carmona released a statement categorically denying the cover-up accusations and saying they “lack any basis.” 

During her press conference on Monday, Sheinbaum played CCTV footage of a man in a Mexico City apartment garage carrying what is purportedly believed to be López’s body, with the Mexico City mayor going on to say that the man caught on tape, along with the presumed killer’s girlfriend, are now in police custody.

“In this case it is evident the Morelos Prosecutor’s Office wanted to hide the femicide, presumably because of links with the presumed killer,” said Sheinbaum.

“It was the duty of Morelos Prosecutor’s Office to carry out the investigation. Without the intervention from Mexico City, this femicide would have gone unpunished.”

The Morelos State Prosecutor’s Office also attempted to remove the security footage evidence from the Condesa apartment building where López was allegedly murdered, said Sheinbaum on Tuesday, Nov. 8.

“Personnel from the Morelos Prosecutor’s Office, without any order or official letter or legal order, arrived at the Campeche street building and in an intimidating manner asked those in the building for access to the cameras,” said Sheinbaum at the time.

Just on Friday, Nov. 4 alone, the dead bodies of five women were found in Morelos, only contributing to Mexico’s enduring femicide crisis, which has seen the intentional murder of 695 women between January and September 2022 with widespread impunity for these crimes.