Former Mexican governor charged over disappearance of 43 students in 2014
Former Guerrero state governor Ángel Aguirre has been formally charged with forced disappearance and obstruction of justice over the 2014 disappearance of 43 students. A judge ordered him held in maximum security prison pending trial.
A Mexican judge ruled on Wednesday that prosecutors had presented sufficient evidence to formally charge former Guerrero governor Ángel Aguirre with forced disappearance. Aguirre, arrested last week, is also accused of obstruction of justice for allegedly ordering the destruction of surveillance footage that might have explained what happened to students from the Ayotzinapa teacher training college on the night of 26 September 2014.
The judge ordered that Aguirre remain in a maximum security prison while awaiting trial. His lawyer, Guillermo Baradas, denied any wrongdoing, saying the defense had presented evidence of a high-level meeting Aguirre attended around the time the tapes were allegedly handed to him.
The charge marks the most significant development in the Ayotzinapa case since the 2022 arrest of Jesús Murillo Karam, who was Mexico's attorney general at the time of the students' abduction.
What happened that night
Students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos teacher training college in Ayotzinapa had commandeered several buses in the city of Iguala, in Guerrero state, intending to travel to a protest in Mexico City. Before they could leave, they were attacked by a local criminal gang working with municipal police. A years-long international investigation found that federal police and military forces were also involved, either directly participating or failing to intervene as the students were taken away and presumably killed.
The government in power at the time orchestrated a cover-up, attempting to pin the blame solely on the criminal gang and local police. Suspects were tortured into giving false confessions, and evidence at the crime scene was manipulated.
Only the remains of three of the 43 students have been identified so far, and the fate of the other 40 remains unknown. Meltión Ortega, a spokesperson for the students, said victims' families want the truth and for those actually responsible to be punished, not another cover-up. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has pledged to uncover what happened and set up a special investigative unit last year to pursue the case.
