Elizabeth de la Rosa, who suffered burns on 90 percent of her body in a bus fire set by a drug cartel in Guadalajara last May, died Monday of multiple organ failure.
De la Rosa had only been back in Guadalajara for a week after a month-long stay the University of Texas Hospital in Galveston. Texas. She underwent nine surgeries there, but her condition did not improve and she was suffering from severe anxiety and wanted to come home, according to family members.
Jalisco Health Secretary Alfonso Petersen rejected the theory that the delicate transfer from Galveston to Guadalajara was a factor in De la Rosa’s death. “We should remember that she was in a critical condition from the moment she sustained her injuries,” he said.
De la Rosa was a passenger on a city bus that was set alight on Avenida Mariano Otero by criminals in the wake of the assassination attempt on former Jalisco Attorney General Luis Carlos Najera outside a city restaurant May 21. Together with her eight-month-old son Tadeo, she was unable to get off the bus before the flames started to engulf her. The infant died at the scene.
The Jalisco state government had promised to assume financial responsibility for De la Rosa’s treatment.
The decision for de la Rosa to return to Guadalajara was taken exclusively by the patient and her close family, Petersen insisted, adding that the Jalisco government is committed to paying the full medical costs in Texas, which come to around US$1.8 million.
Although specialists at the Texas hospital had warned about the dangers of moving de la Rosa, the family was in no doubt that was what she wanted.
“There was no more that could be done,” her husband Carlos Alexis Velázquez said Tuesday. “She really wanted to live but her wounds were not compatible with life.”
In another interview Wednesday, Petersen said that De la Rosa and her mother had only requested “basic medical attention” on her return to Guadalajara.
Jalisco Governor Aristoteles Sandoval sent his condolences noting that his administration would provide “total support” to de la Rosa’s family. He also vowed to continue the investigation and root out those responsible, regardless of the time and manpower involved.
On Thursday, Jalisco Attorney General Raul Sanchez Jimenez revealed that state police had arrested a man suspected of being one of those responsible for starting the fire on the bus that claimed the lives of De la Rosa and Tadeo.
The suspect was identified as 26-year-old Luis Alfredo “N”, alias “El Sica”, a resident of Zapopan. He had been ordered by his CJNG bosses to seek out and set alight a bus on a busy city street as a diversionary tactic in the hours following the assassination attempt on Najera, Sanchez Jimenez said.
No other arrests have been made in connection with the assassination attempt or the burning of three city buses. Sources close to the Jalisco state government told Spanish-Language daily Milenio that there are indications the three people involved in the bus burning incident that killed De la Rosa and her son have since been assassinated.
Around 40 people attended a silent candlelight vigil on Tuesday evening for De la Rosa and her son at the Glorieta Niños Heroes monument.
At the vigil, Velazquez said Jalisco“is still waiting” for justice to be done.
Several hundred mourners attended De la Rosa’s funeral and burial the next day.